Israel in Bible Prophecy
The New Testament Fulfillment
of the Promise to Abraham
By Brian Godawa
Israel in Bible Prophecy: The New Testament Fulfillment of the Promise to
Abraham
2nd Edition b
Copyright © 2017, 2021 Brian Godawa
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or
by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and
retrieval systems, without prior written permission, except in the case of
brief quotations in critical articles and reviews.
Warrior Poet Publishing
www.warriorpoetpublishing.com
ISBN: 978-1-942858-37-9 (paperback)
Scripture quotations taken from The Holy Bible: English Standard Version.
Wheaton: Standard Bible Society, 2001, except where noted as the NASB:
New American Standard Bible: 1995 Update. (LaHabra, CA: The Lockman
Foundation, 1995).
Dedicated to
The fans of Chronicles of the Apocalypse
Table of Contents
1 Who Are the Children of Abraham?.................................. 5
2 Father of Many Nations .................................................. 10
3 Children of Abraham ....................................................... 14
4 Everlasting Covenant ..................................................... 20
5 Land Promise ................................................................. 22
6 Conditional Covenant ..................................................... 33
7 Circumcision ................................................................... 42
8 The Temple .................................................................... 47
9 Blessing and Cursing ...................................................... 54
10 The Regathering of Israel ............................................. 56
11 Old Testament Shadow, New Testament Reality ......... 87
Get the Theology behind Chronicles of the Apocalypse.. 966
Get More Biblical Imagination ............................................ 98
Chronicles of the Nephilim ................................................. 99
Chronicles of the Apocalypse .......................................... 100
Chronicles of the Watchers ............................................. 101
About The Author ............................................................ 102
1
Who Are the Children of Abraham?
Many Christians believe that the Jews of today are still God’s
“chosen people.” Yet most of these same Christians maintain that
personal salvation can only be received through faith in Jesus Christ.
They hold to the belief that God still has a special plan for the
geographical entity of Israel and those they believe are the physical
descendants of Abraham.
Every day, prophecy pundits in the media exegete newspapers
tirelessly proclaiming that current world events “are all prophesied
right in the Bible” and now being fulfilled “right before our eyes.”
They’ve been doing this for over 170 years, changing their
interpretations as their predictions failed to occur. Prophetic
speculation is upgraded and updated for the next go-round. The
merchandisers of prophecy know that sizeable financial rewards can
come from the right kind of alarming message in what has become a
business I call the Bible Prophecy Industrial Complex. Millions of
dollars flows into the coffers of prophecy ministries every year
through conferences, books, dvds, and other media, teaching their
peculiar viewpoints in relation to newspaper headlines. This kind of
big business Bible preaching can be corrupting, through blurring
motives and creating a need for constant sensationalism, that often
vulgarizes the real intent of prophetic passages, completely out of their
original contexts.
The dominant prophetic scheme, usually called Dispensationalism
(and it’s grandfather, Premillennialism), teaches that the modern
ethnic or genetic people called Jews and their modern geopolitical
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land called Israel are still the center of God’s redemptive plan because,
after all, God made a promise to Abraham about multiplying his
descendants and giving them the Promised Land, and God isn’t about
to change his mind. Dispensationalists cite Exodus 32:13 where God
says to Moses:
Exodus 32:13
“Remember Abraham, Isaac, and Israel, your servants, to
whom you swore by your own self, and said to them, ‘I will
multiply your offspring as the stars of heaven, and all this land
that I have promised I will give to your offspring, and they
shall inherit it forever.’ ”
This verse says that God’s promise of inheritance to Abraham’s
offspring is “forever,” so it logically follows that it is still in effect,
right? After all, God doesn’t fall back on his promises. So, He must
still be intent upon giving a physical Israel that physical land He
promised so long ago, or else God is a liar, right?
Wrong. This Dispensational viewpoint is not merely unbiblical, it
is a serious negation of the glorious New Covenant that God
established with the coming of Messiah/Christ. Dispensationalists
advanced their novel belief, after 1800 years of church history, that
God has two separate plans, one for Israel after the flesh and one for
the New Testament Church after the spirit. So they attempt to
maintain special status for Israel while also affirming the New
Covenant. It’s as if God has two covenants, one with the Jews and one
with the Church. But this attempt at simultaneous plans for different
“people of God” is ultimately a repudiation of the very concept of the
New Covenant in Christ that has abolished all distinction between Jew
and Gentile. To say that the physical descendants of Abraham are
God’s chosen people after Messiah has come and fulfilled the Old
Covenant types and shadows is to negate the New Covenant itself and
replace it with a return to the types and shadows that it has replaced.
At about this point, a common knee jerk reaction assumes that
such a viewpoint is “anti-Semitic” bringing on some future
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persecution of the Jews, a “road to holocaust” as one merchandiser of
prophecy proclaimed. Well nothing could be further from the truth.
Let me state at the outset that I support the modern state of Israel’s
right to exist and right to kill terrorist peoples and nations whose sole
intent is to “drive the Jews into the sea,” (obliterating them as a people
and a nation). I believe modern Israel is a legitimate sovereign nation
and has every moral and legal right to self-defense against the tyranny
of Muslim oppression that surrounds Israel and seeks to destroy her. I
support the modern state of Israel because she is the sole
representative democratic ally of the United States in the Middle East
surrounded by monstrous tyranny. And I consider the anti-Semitism of
Left Wing politics that demonizes Israel to be itself a revival of
demonic Nazi thought patterns.
But a moral right to the land is not the same thing as a “divine
right” to the land. And to understand that difference, we must see what
God himself says about the promise to Abraham.
The Promise
Exodus 32:13 is really a reference to the original promise God
made to Abraham in Genesis. Let’s take a look at it and see what we
can learn:
Genesis 17:4–10
“Behold, my covenant is with you, and you shall be the father
of a multitude of nations. 5 No longer shall your name be called
Abram, but your name shall be Abraham, for I have made you
the father of a multitude of nations. 6 I will make you
exceedingly fruitful, and I will make you into nations, and
kings shall come from you. 7 And I will establish my covenant
between me and you and your offspring after you throughout
their generations for an everlasting covenant, to be God to you
and to your offspring after you. 8 And I will give to you and to
your offspring after you the land of your sojournings, all the
land of Canaan, for an everlasting possession, and I will be
their God.” 9 And God said to Abraham, “As for you, you shall
keep my covenant, you and your offspring after you throughout
their generations. 10 This is my covenant, which you shall keep,
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between me and you and your offspring after you: Every male
among you shall be circumcised.
Now, what we see here are several elements to the one Promise
made to Abraham by God. One, He will be a father of many nations (v
5). Two, the Promise is to Abraham and his offspring (literally: seed),
which is stressed over and over throughout the passage (v 7). Three, it
is an everlasting covenant, one that does not change (v 7). Four,
Abraham’s descendants shall inherit the land of Canaan, the land of
Promise (v 8). Five, the covenant is conditioned upon their obedience
(v 9). Six, the covenant is sealed by circumcision (v 10).
1) Father of many nations
2) Children of Abraham
3) Everlasting Covenant
4) Land Promise
5) Conditional Covenant
6) Circumcision
What I want to show is that each and every one of these elements
of the Promise made to Abraham, is shown in the Scriptures to be
fulfilled completely in Christ and his spiritual international body on
earth, not in a physical or geographical nation of Israel.
Some have called this by the pejorative title, “Replacement
Theology,” as if God replaces Israel with the Church. But while this
vulgar oversimplification may be helpful in targeting a Straw Man
easy to take down, it does not reflect what the Bible is actually saying
nor what I am saying. It is not a replacement that occurs, but rather a
fulfillment and transformation in Christ that results in an exclusion of
those who mistakenly consider themselves part of the Promise.
In short, from the beginning, God always intended that those who
are of faith are his true Chosen People, not those who are of physical
descent from Abraham. God’s Promise to Abraham is fulfilled and
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applied to those who are in Christ, and the seal of that covenant is
circumcision of the Spirit, not of the flesh.
2 Corinthians 1:20–22
For all the promises of God find their Yes in him…And it is
God who establishes us with you in Christ, and has anointed us,
and who has also put his seal on us and given us his Spirit in
our hearts as a guarantee.
But I’m getting ahead of myself. Let’s start from the beginning.
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2
Father of Many Nations
Genesis 17:4–5 (NKJV)
“As for Me, behold, My covenant is with you, and you shall be
a father of many nations. 5 No longer shall your name be called
Abram, but your name shall be Abraham; for I have made you
a father of many nations.”
Genesis 26:4
I will multiply your offspring as the stars of heaven and will
give to your offspring all these lands. And in your offspring all
the nations of the earth shall be blessed.”
4
It is common to misunderstand this promise of blessing to the
nations as meaning that Israel will become an exalted geopolitical entity
sometime in our future, and therefore a shining example to the Gentiles
to join or emulate. As if they will remain a separated people from the
other nations. But this view is mistaken, because God was not referring
to the physical generation of peoples from Abraham’s loins, but to the
spiritual regeneration of peoples through faith. Look at how the New
Testament declares how this promise was actually fulfilled:
Romans 4:13–18
13
For the promise to Abraham and his offspring that he would
be heir of the world did not come through the law but through
the righteousness of faith. 14 For if it is the adherents of the law
who are to be the heirs, faith is null and the promise is void. 15
For the law brings wrath, but where there is no law there is no
transgression. 16 That is why it depends on faith, in order that
the promise may rest on grace and be guaranteed to all his
offspring—not only to the adherent of the law but also to the
one who shares the faith of Abraham, who is the father of us
all, 17 as it is written, “I have made you the father of many
nations”… 18 In hope he believed against hope, that he should
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Israel in Bible Prophecy
become the father of many nations, as he had been told, “So
shall your offspring be.”
Notice that Paul is saying that the promise to Abraham’s
descendants is fulfilled “through the righteousness of faith,” not
through the Law (or Torah, which was the distinguishing mark of
being Israel). In Romans 3 and 4, he makes the case that the physical
Jew who received the Law of God and circumcision is not at an
advantage over the Gentile because all are under sin. The Law cannot
make the Jew righteous, but can only reveal sin and drive one to faith
in Christ. By the time Paul gets to Abraham in chapter 4, he shows
that even Abraham himself was not made righteous through the act of
circumcision, but through his faith which he had while being an
uncircumcised Gentile.
Therefore, God’s promise of multiplying descendants and being
a father of many nations is explicitly declared by Paul to be fulfilled
through the righteousness of faith (the New Covenant), not through
physical generation. He goes so far as to say in verse 14 that if the
inheritance was through the Law made to the physical Jews, then the
promise would actually be nullified! “Those who are of the faith of
Abraham” (v. 16) are the inheritors, not mere physical descendants.
Abraham’s descendants are believing Christians, both Jew and
Gentile, not unbelieving Jews.
The complaint may arise that verse 16 indicates God maintains
separate relations or two different covenants with the physical Jews
and Gentile believers. Doesn’t the verse say, “in order that the promise
may be certain to all the descendants, not only those who are of the
Law, but also to those who are of the faith of Abraham, who is the
father of us all”? So are there not two lines of descendants, physical
and spiritual?
Not in context. Don’t forget Paul’s main point that just because
the physical Jews received the Law and were circumcised, does not
make them righteous or even Abraham’s children. He is trying to
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show that faith is the common denominator between the Jewish
believer and the Gentile believer.
Romans 3:29–30
Or is God the God of Jews only? Is he not the God of Gentiles
also? Yes, of Gentiles also, 30 since God is one—who will
justify the circumcised by faith and the uncircumcised through
faith.
So Paul is trying to explain that just because one is a physical Jew
and has been circumcised, does not mean he is righteous or saved. The
circumcised must also have faith. So in the verse just before the
controversial one we are discussing, he explains what he means by
saying,
Romans 4:12
and to make him the father of the circumcised who are not
merely circumcised but who also walk in the footsteps of the
faith that our father Abraham had before he was circumcised.
So he is not talking about two plans in verse 16, one for Jews and
one for Gentiles, he is not saying that there are two peoples of God
through two different physical identities, but rather that the two
physical identities are irrelevant, and they are one entity through faith
in Christ. The circumcised Jew must not only have the Law
(circumcision) but must also have faith or Abraham is not his father.
In the book of Galatians, Paul writes to Christians who have been
hoodwinked into thinking that they must add to their faith an
obedience to the distinctive laws of Jewish identity, or they are not
saved. He addresses the very same Genesis Promise to Abraham and
blessing of the nations by explaining that the blessing of the nations
was not in Jewish identity but in faith. All the nations are blessed
through justification by faith in Jesus Christ, not by a physical Israel
with worldly power and glory.
Galatians 3:8–9
And the Scripture, foreseeing that God would justify the
Gentiles by faith, preached the gospel beforehand to Abraham,
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saying, “In you shall all the nations be blessed.” 9 So then,
those who are of faith are blessed along with Abraham, the man
of faith.
Paul is very clear that “In you shall all the nations be blessed,”
means Gentiles will be justified through the faith of Abraham, not
through his loins or through a national Israel separate from the
Gentiles. Abraham is the father of Gentiles who come from all the
nations and believe in Jesus Christ.
This is not to say that Gentiles alone are who God is saving or
justifying, but rather both Jew and Gentile who believe. There is no favor
of one over the other, there is only favor of those who believe. And those
who believe are from “every nation, from all tribes and peoples and
languages” (Rev 7:9). That is how Abraham is a father of many nations.
He is the father of those who have faith from all the nations.
Which leads us to the second element of the Promise fulfilled.
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3
Children of Abraham
Genesis 17:7
And I will establish my covenant between me and you and your
offspring after you throughout their generations for an
everlasting covenant, to be God to you and to your offspring
after you.
The second part of God’s promise to Abraham “and your
offspring after you throughout their generations...” is really another
aspect of the first element of Abraham being the father of many
nations. But I have separated it out because it is the basis of the
concept “seed of Abraham” or “children of Abraham” that is
frequently referred to in the Older and Newer Covenants. What I want
to prove here is that the Abrahamic “offspring” God is referring to
was never the mere physical offspring of flesh, but has always been
the spiritual offspring of faith.
In Galatians, Paul writes about the Judaizers, or the “party of the
circumcision” (Gal 2:12). These men were saying to Gentile believers
that they must become Jews in addition to their faith by bearing the
physical marker of circumcision or they would not be considered the
true sons of Abraham (Gal 2:4; 5:1-6). The Judaizers were affirming
the special status of the physically circumcised Jews as sons of
Abraham, sons of the Promise, the receivers of “the blessing.” But
Paul violently disagreed by explaining that it is faith that makes one a
son of Abraham to receive the promised blessing, not genetic or
Jewishness according to the flesh.
Galatians 3:6–9
6
just as Abraham “believed God, and it was counted to him as
righteousness”? 7 Know then that it is those of faith who are the
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sons of Abraham. 8 And the Scripture, foreseeing that God
would justify the Gentiles by faith, preached the gospel
beforehand to Abraham, saying, “In you shall all the nations be
blessed.” 9 So then, those who are of faith are blessed along
with Abraham, the man of faith.
So here again, that same Abrahamic promise from Genesis is
quoted as being made to those of faith, not flesh. He explicitly says
that “those who are of faith are sons of Abraham,” “those who are of
faith are blessed with Abraham.” He says that it was the promise of
faith that was preached to Abraham when he made the Promise of all
nations and descendants. There could be no clearer proof that God has
always meant faith as the means of sonship, not flesh or physical
descent or Jewish identity markers.
But just in case, the Dispensationalist can’t see the obvious, Paul
goes further to explain that the promise made to the offspring (“seed”)
of Abraham was to the singular person of Christ, not the plural people
of the land.
Galatians 3:16
Now the promises were made to Abraham and to his offspring.
It does not say, “And to offsprings,” referring to many, but
referring to one, “And to your offspring,” who is Christ.
The word that we have translated as “offspring” is also translated
as “seed,” but the point remains the same. So Paul writes that all those
promises—all six points of the covenant—that were made to Abraham,
were really made to Christ (singular), NOT the physical descendants
(plural). According to God’s Word, Jesus Christ is the Seed of
Abraham to whom the Promise was made. It could not be clearer.
He then equates “sons of Abraham” with “sons of God.” We partake
of that Abrahamic Promise by being “in Christ” through our faith.
Galatians 3:26–29
26
for in Christ Jesus you are all sons of God, through faith. 27
…for you are all one in Christ Jesus. 29 And if you are Christ’s,
then you are Abraham’s offspring, heirs according to promise.
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Notice the last line. Abraham’s offspring, those who are heirs of
the promise to Abraham, are not the physical descendants of flesh, but
the faithful in Christ. We believers inherit the Promise made to
Abraham! The Promise of inheritance was never intended by God to
refer to a genetic or nation state of Israel, but to the faithful in Christ.
Now, of course, the faithful Jewish believers in the Old and New
Testaments are included in that Promise (The OT believer looked
forward to Messiah, the NT believer looks backward to Messiah), but
both Jew and Gentile are included in the Promise through faith! The
point is that there is no special status for a physical Israel of flesh in
God’s plan. Never was. It was always the faithful to whom God was
making the Promise.
Later in the same book of Galatians, Paul takes this dichotomy of
faithful versus physical farther and makes the separation even more
stark. This passage is particularly indicting against the
Dispensationalist because Paul talks specifically about the difference
between fleshly Israel and faithful Israel, and stresses that fleshly
Israel is never what God’s promise was all about. Paul allegorically
likens physical Israel (“according to the flesh”) with the physical
Jerusalem that was in slavery in the first century and the physical
descendants of Hagar as the symbol of those fleshly offspring. Then
he likens the faithful believers to the heavenly Jerusalem that he calls
free, and it is these free faithful that are the inheritors of the promise,
not the physical nation.
Galatians 4:22–26
22
For it is written that Abraham had two sons, one by a slave
woman and one by a free woman. 23 But the son of the slave
was born according to the flesh, while the son of the free
woman was born through promise. 24 Now this may be
interpreted allegorically: these women are two covenants. One
is from Mount Sinai, bearing children for slavery; she is Hagar.
25
Now Hagar is Mount Sinai in Arabia; she corresponds to the
present Jerusalem, for she is in slavery with her children. 26 But
the Jerusalem above is free, and she is our mother.
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The “children of promise” are here spoken of as definitively being
those who are of faith, not those who are physical Jews “according to
the flesh.” In fact, Paul writes that the physical Jews who were
persecuting the Christians during his lifetime were those “fleshly”
slaves of Hagar:
Galatians 4:29
29
But just as at that time he who was born according to the
flesh persecuted him who was born according to the Spirit, so
also it is now.
And then he concludes by saying that the physical Jews who do
not have faith in Christ will not inherit the Promise along with the
faithful:
Galatians 4:30–31
30
But what does the Scripture say? “Cast out the slave woman
and her son, for the son of the slave woman shall not inherit
with the son of the free woman.” 31 So, brothers, we are not
children of the slave but of the free woman.
There could be no stronger denial that the physical Jewish
descendants will inherit the Promise of Abraham. According to
Scripture, it isn’t going to happen. The physical descendants “shall not
be an heir” with the faithful sons of Abraham. Not in Paul’s time, not
in the future. There are not two plans, one for believing Gentiles and
one for physical Jews. Only Jews who believe in Messiah will inherit
the Promise along with the believing Gentiles. Believers alone are the
“children of promise.” God’s promise to Abraham is not to Israel of
the flesh, but to Israel of faith (that includes both Jew and Gentile).
Galatians 4:23
23
But the son of the slave was born according to the flesh,
while the son of the free woman was born through promise… 28
Now you, brothers, like Isaac, are children of promise.
And this brings us to another passage, Romans 9, which also
speaks of Isaac and the continuation of the Promise to Abraham’s
offspring. Yet, here again, the distinction is made that God’s Promise
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to Abraham was not to fleshly descendants of Abraham, but to faithful
believers like Abraham:
Romans 9:3–8
3
For I could wish that I myself were accursed and cut off from
Christ for the sake of my brothers, my kinsmen according to
the flesh. 4 They are Israelites, and to them belong the adoption,
the glory, the covenants, the giving of the law, the worship, and
the promises. 5 To them belong the patriarchs, and from their
race, according to the flesh, is the Christ, who is God over all,
blessed forever. Amen. 6 But it is not as though the word of
God has failed. For not all who are descended from Israel
belong to Israel, 7 and not all are children of Abraham because
they are his offspring, but “Through Isaac shall your offspring
be named.” 8 This means that it is not the children of the flesh
who are the children of God, but the children of the promise are
counted as offspring.
Paul notes that physical Israel (“according to the flesh”) were
given the adoption, the glory, the covenants, Law, temple and
promises. But then he states that nevertheless, not all fleshly
descendants of Israel are actually Israel. Just because people were
born in the physical line of Abraham does not make them Israel. Why?
Because “children of the flesh are not the children of God, but the
children of the promise are regarded as offspring!” And who has Paul
established are “children of the promise” in Galatians and elsewhere?
Believers!! Believers are the descendants of Abraham and Isaac, and
children of the promise, NOT physical Jews “according to the flesh.”
It seems to be a theme of Paul to hammer home this idea that
God’s promises were never made to physical descendants of
Abraham, but rather to a spiritual remnant of true believers within the
community of physical descendants. With the inauguration of the New
Covenant, the “other sheep not of this fold” (Gentiles who also
believe) are now included in on that Promise. The righteous has
always lived by faith. God’s promise was never made to physical
Israel, but to “spiritual” Israel, or those with faith. This is why the
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Gentile believer is a true Jew, and a circumcised unbelieving fleshly
Jew is not:
Romans 2:28–29
28
For no one is a Jew who is merely one outwardly, nor is
circumcision outward and physical. 29 But a Jew is one inwardly,
and circumcision is a matter of the heart, by the Spirit, not by the
letter. His praise is not from man but from God.
To conclude then, we see the New Testament go out of its way to
stress that the offspring of Abraham, the “children of Abraham” to
whom God made his promises, are not the physical Jews in the
geographical land now called Israel, but are in fact all believers, both
Jew and Gentile, not bound by any land. This is what Paul means when
he says in Ephesians 2:14 that Christ “made both groups into one, and
broke down the barrier of the dividing wall, by abolishing in His flesh
the enmity, which is the Law of commandments contained in
ordinances, that in Himself He might make the two into one new man.”
We simply cannot divide Jew from Gentile in God’s promise or
plan as the Dispensationalist would want. Jew and Gentile believers
are one in Christ and cannot be separated because that which separated
them (The Laws of separation in the OT) has been abolished. To say
that God has a separate plan for unbelieving physical Jews who reject
Jesus as Messiah is to deny the very fulfillment of God’s promise to
true Israel, the spiritual unity of Jew and Gentile who believe in Jesus.
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4
Everlasting Covenant
Genesis 17:7
And I will establish my covenant between me and you and your
offspring after you throughout their generations for an
everlasting covenant, to be God to you and to your offspring
after you.
This third element of the Abrahamic Promise made by God is
often a lynch pin for Dispensationalists because it appears to them that
this substantiates the fact that even though the New Testament has
arrived, it does not change a promise that is made “everlasting” to
Abraham’s offspring. This is why the Dispensationalist believes that
there are two plans, one for the New Covenant and one for the “eternal
promise” of the Old Covenant. Well, by now it is clear that this writer
is fully in support of the eternality of God’s promise. Yes, God keeps
his promises, and if he says it is an everlasting covenant, it is.
But how he keeps his promises is sadly too often misunderstood,
and to whom that everlasting covenant is made is misattributed by
Dispensationalists. As I already argued above, the Children of
Abraham, Abraham’s offspring, are not physical descendants from his
loins, but rather those who have faith in Jesus Christ. So New
Covenant believers in Jesus are precisely those children of Abraham
to whom God is still eternally fulfilling those promises. The New
Covenant is the continuation of God’s eternal promise of inheritance
to Abraham’s Seed:
Hebrews 9:15
Therefore [Jesus] is the mediator of a new covenant, so that
those who are called may receive the promised eternal
inheritance.
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Yes, the promise is eternal, it’s just not inherited by physically
circumcised Jews, but by believers in Christ. According to the
Scriptures, New Testament believers are the ones receiving God’s
everlasting covenant made to Abraham of an everlasting inheritance.
And what is that inheritance, but the land of Promise, the land of
Canaan? Again, this inheritance is misunderstood by many. So let’s
conquer that promised land next.
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Land Promise
Genesis 17:8
8
“And I will give to you [Abraham] and to your offspring after
you the land of your sojournings, all the land of Canaan, for an
everlasting possession, and I will be their God.”
So why did God promise Abraham the land of Canaan? Was it
just a kind of territory grab? In order to understand what this
“inheritance” thing is all about, we must go way back to the tower of
Babel. Here is what Moses wrote about that incident:
Deuteronomy 32:8–9
8
When the Most High gave to the nations their inheritance,
when he divided mankind, he fixed the borders of the peoples
according to the number of the sons of God. 9 But the LORD’s
portion is his people, Jacob his allotted heritage.
This passage shows the origin of the inheritance of land
(“heritage”) being at the Tower of Babel. Mankind had been united in
evil with their pursuit of idolatry and self-deification (“let us make a
name for ourselves”). Genesis 10 gives us the seventy nations that
came out of that Babel incident. And Moses writes that the borders of
those nations were established, and rebellious humanity was given
over to the authority of the sons of God.
Who are these sons of God? While there is disagreement over this
question, I have argued in my book When Giants Were Upon the
Earth, that they were in fact, the rebel divine beings who fell to earth
during the days of Noah.
So why would God allot Gentile nations to those fallen angelic
beings? Because they refused to worship Yahweh, and continued to
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worship other gods. Another Deuteronomy passage clarifies this
allotment of the Gentiles to false gods.
Deuteronomy 4:19–20
19
And beware lest you raise your eyes to heaven, and when you
see the sun and the moon and the stars, all the host of heaven,
you be drawn away and bow down to them and serve them,
things that the LORD your God has allotted to all the peoples
under the whole heaven. 20 But the LORD has taken you and
brought you out of the iron furnace, out of Egypt, to be a people
of his own inheritance, as you are this day.
In the ancient world, people considered the stars to be both signs
in the heavens as well as gods. They called them “host of heaven”
because they believed them to be divine beings who resided in the
heavens. So God is saying that he “allotted” those Gentile nations to
their false gods as their inheritance. The false gods were spiritual
authorities over fallen mankind and their geographical territories.
At the same time, and in the same way, God allotted the offspring
of Abraham to be his inheritance, and their territory would be the land
of Canaan. So the concept of inheritance was tightly wound into the
notion of land and the spiritual territorial authority over that land. The
book of Daniel calls these territorial spiritual powers, “Watchers,” and
“Princes” over nations (Dan 4:13, 21; 10:13, 20-21).
So when God promised Abraham the land of Canaan as his
inherited possession, he was merely updating his original land
allotment made at Babel. The title deeds to the rest of the earth were in
the hands of the Watchers, the fallen sons of God. But God held the
title deed to Canaan for Israel’s inheritance. This was why inheriting
land and keeping it within the tribes of Israel was so important in
God’s Law. It was all about maintaining that allotment, that promised
inheritance.
But something else also happened on the way to the New
Covenant. The notion of Israel’s inheritance was transformed from a
local land of Canaan into all the earth because of Messiah.
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Psalm 2:7–8
7
I will tell of the decree: The LORD said to me, “You are my
Son; today I have begotten you. 8 Ask of me, and I will make
the nations your heritage, and the ends of the earth your
possession.
Messiah would take the title deed of land away from the false
gods of the nations and would end up inheriting, not merely Canaan,
but all the earth. This is in fact what Jesus did in his death,
resurrection and ascension: he defeated the evil principalities and
powers over the nations, took back their title deeds, and led them in a
triumphal march of victory over them (Col 2:15; Eph 4:8). Now
people of every tribe and nation would be God’s inheritance, and he
would be theirs. Jesus destroyed the separation between Jew and
Gentile nations (Eph 2:11-22). The inheritance of God’s people is no
longer a single plot of land in the Middle East called Israel, it is all the
earth because God’s people are from all the earth, all the nations.
Have you ever wondered why there is no more literal or direct
references to the land inheritance in the New Testament? Because of
the New Covenant, the localized nationalistic land inheritance has
necessarily been redirected by God into spiritual fulfillment in Christ.
The kingdom of God is the Land of Promise in Christ. Our inheritance
as the people of God is not a physical piece of land, but a heavenly
land, not an earthly kingdom, but a spiritual kingdom, the kingdom of
God (1Cor 15:50).
1 Peter 1:3–4
3
He has caused us to be born again to a living hope through the
resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, 4 to an inheritance
that is imperishable, undefiled, and unfading, kept in heaven
for you.
Hebrews 9:15
15
Therefore he is the mediator of a new covenant, so that those
who are called may receive the promised eternal inheritance…
Notice in this Hebrews passage below that the writer says that the
promised land to Abraham was never the true promised land, but
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Israel in Bible Prophecy
merely an earthly reference that looked forward to the true fulfillment
of a heavenly land, a heavenly city.
Hebrews 11:8–10, 15-16
8
By faith Abraham obeyed when he was called to go out to a
place that he was to receive as an inheritance….9 By faith he
went to live in the land of promise, with Isaac and Jacob, heirs
with him of the same promise. 10 For he was looking forward to
the city that has foundations, whose designer and builder is
God…15 If they had been thinking of that land from which they
had gone out, they would have had opportunity to return. 16 But
as it is, they desire a better country, that is, a heavenly one.
Therefore God is not ashamed to be called their God, for he has
prepared for them a city.
That heavenly city of that eternal inheritance is the New
Jerusalem, which is a metaphor for the New Covenant in Jesus Christ,
the Messiah. The physical land of promise and the earthly city of God
has been spiritually fulfilled in Christ.
Hebrews 12:22–24
22
But you [Christians] have come to Mount Zion and to the
city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem…and to Jesus,
the mediator of a new covenant.
The inheritance of land in the Old Covenant has been transformed
into an inheritance of international land without boundaries created by
the “breaking down of the dividing wall” between Jew and
Gentile. There can no longer be a geographical land that God is
promising to his people because his people are international, from
every tongue and nation. To affirm an earthly nationalistic plan of
God is to reinstitute the Laws of separation between Jew and Gentile
that Christ abolished. It is to break the “one man” back into two,
which is what the Dispensationalist is trying to do by positing two
“promises” of God, two “chosen peoples,” two “children of
Abraham.”
Ephesians 2:14-16
[Christ] made both groups [Jew and Gentile] into one, and broke
down the barrier of the dividing wall, 15 by abolishing in His
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flesh the enmity, which is the Law of commandments contained
in ordinances, that in Himself He might make the two into one
new man...16 and might reconcile them both in one body to God
through the cross, by it having put to death the enmity.”
Galatians 3:28-29
There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free
man, there is neither male nor female; for you are all one in
Christ Jesus. 29 And if you belong to Christ, then you are
Abraham’s offspring, heirs according to promise.
“Abolish” is a very powerful word. In the original Greek, it is the
word, katargeo; which means “to render inoperative.” Elsewhere in
the Bible it is translated variously as “bring to an end,” “nullify,”
“remove,” and “render powerless.” Abraham’s descendants
(“offspring”), the heirs of the promise, those who are “in Christ,” are
not separated from other nations. This is a very important key to
understanding the nature of the New Covenant: Those laws of
separation between Jew and Gentile have been abolished, “put to
death,” nullified, removed, rendered powerless!
And what is the biggest expression of separation between nations?
LAND!!! In the Old Testament God was separating a national people
unto Himself and giving them a separate piece of land to have among
the nations. But with the New Covenant, that separation of land and
people has been abolished. This is why Christianity claims there are no
more Holy Wars in this New Covenant era; because the Holy Wars of
Jehovah were tied directly to inheriting the geographical land in the Old
Testament. Separation of Jew from Gentile. Since there is no more
national distinction made by God, then he has no specific national or
geographical interest in a parcel of land.
But this is not the entire picture. Actually, God does have a
geographical interest in land. That is, He wants all the earth as the
possession of the people of God, not a mere parcel of land in the
Middle East! His meek ones shall inherit the earth! The kingdom of
God is growing like a mustard seed into the biggest tree on earth (Matt
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13:31-32). It is spreading like leaven through all the earth! (Matt
13:33). The cornerstone of Jesus Christ and his kingdom is, right now
as you read this, growing to be a mountain that fills all the earth and
crushes all other kingdoms (Dan 2:35) not a mere tract of sand and
rock in the desert!
Colossians 1:15
And He is the image of the invisible God, the first-born of all
creation....all things have been created by Him and for Him.
In this verse above, we see that Jesus is the first-born of all
creation. Biblically, this is not a reference to Jesus being born or
created, but rather an indication of status. That is, the first born son in
the Old Testament economy was the primary inheritor of the father’s
estate. In fact, the first born had the birthright (Gen 43:33), The place
of preeminence and power (Gen 49:3). He received a double portion
of that inheritance (Deut 21:17). So the purpose of this Colossians
verse is to indicate that Christ actually inherited all of creation, not
merely a single parcel of it. The land promise is merely a metaphor for
a creation-wide inheritance.
Here’s the kicker: the Scriptures also say that Christians are joint heirs
with Christ. Christians will inherit all things of that creation with him:
Romans 8:17
and if children, heirs also, heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ.
1 Corinthians 3:21-22
So then let no one boast in men. For all things belong to you,
whether ... the world or life or death or things present or things
to come; all things belong to you...
The serious error of Dispensationalism becomes crystal clear in this
light of “inheritance”: The proposal that God still maintains a promise of
physical land to a nationally separated people of race is to deny the
essence of the New Covenant. The land laws and separation laws are
abolished in Christ; The promised land is now all the earth in Christ, not a
desert patch. The Kingdom of God fulfills the land promise. God’s
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chosen people are Jewish and Gentile believers in Messiah, not
physically circumcised unbelieving Jews. The promotion of nationalistic
racial interest is a negation of God’s New Covenant interracial
internationalism. In short, Dispensationalism is a kind of racism.
Related to this geographical promise are the terms, Mount Zion
and Jerusalem. In Scripture, these terms are used, very often together,
as symbolic references to the Kingdom of God, and the city of God, or
God’s reign. There are literally hundreds of such references, but here
are just two:
Zechariah 8:3
“Thus says the LORD, ‘I will return to Zion and will dwell in
the midst of Jerusalem. Then Jerusalem will be called the City
of Truth, and the mountain of the LORD of hosts will be called
the Holy Mountain.’
Micah 4:2
And many nations will come and say, “Come and let us go up
to the mountain of the LORD And to the house of the God of
Jacob, That He may teach us about His ways And that we may
walk in His paths.” For from Zion will go forth the law, Even
the word of the LORD from Jerusalem.
As you can readily see, I’ve chosen some specific verses that use
Zion and Jerusalem in reference to Messiah, who of course, is Jesus
Christ. Dispensationalists claim that these are all literal references to
earthly Mount Zion and Jerusalem. But the New Testament defines the
concepts of Zion and Jerusalem as heavenly, or transcendent, which
means they are terms that use literal locations as a metaphor for a
more important spiritual idea. Sometimes they are references to the
literal geographical sites in context, but in general, they are spiritual
references to the Kingdom of God.
In Hebrews 12, the writer talks about Moses and the Old Covenant
and how he received the Law on the mountain with blazing fire and
God’s glory. But then he shows that the Newer Covenant is not merely
greater than the Older, but it is the true spiritual fulfillment of the “types
and shadows” of the Old.
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Hebrews 12:22–24
22
But you have come to Mount Zion and to the city of the
living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and to innumerable angels
in festal gathering, 23 and to the assembly of the firstborn who
are enrolled in heaven, and to God, the judge of all, and to the
spirits of the righteous made perfect, 24 and to Jesus, the
mediator of a new covenant.
Here, we see that the New Covenant is Mount Zion spoken of in
the Old Covenant. Coming to Jesus is coming to the heavenly
Jerusalem, the true spiritual reality that the Old Covenant types
pointed to. There can be no physical earthly Jerusalem or Mount Zion
that God is promising to do anything with, because His promise was
fulfilled in Christ and His Kingdom, the heavenly (spiritual) Mount
Zion and Jerusalem!
This is the theme of Hebrews: that the Old Covenant was a
physical type or shadow of the spiritual reality which is in Jesus
Christ:
Hebrews 8:5
[The priests of Old Covenant Law] serve a copy and shadow of
heavenly things.
Hebrews 9:23
Therefore it was necessary for the copies of the things in the
heavens to be cleansed with these [physical sacrifices], but the
heavenly things themselves with better sacrifices than these. 24
For Christ did not enter a holy place made with hands, a mere
copy of the true one, but into heaven itself, now to appear in the
presence of God for us.
This heavenly Jerusalem corresponds to the “New Jerusalem that
comes down out of heaven” in Revelation 21. The heavenly Jerusalem
is the true Jerusalem, not the physical one. And the true, new
Jerusalem is the New Covenant populated by believers in Christ, not
mere circumcised genetic Israelites.
If there is any doubt left about this heavenly reality, the Apostle
Paul, in a passage we saw earlier, emphasizes this true Jerusalem of
promise as the Church of Christ consisting of believers in Christ:
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Galatians 4:22–31
22
For it is written that Abraham had two sons, one by a slave
woman and one by a free woman. 23 But the son of the slave was
born according to the flesh, while the son of the free woman was
born through promise. 24 Now this may be interpreted
allegorically: these women are two covenants. One is from
Mount Sinai, bearing children for slavery; she is Hagar. 25 Now
Hagar is Mount Sinai in Arabia; she corresponds to the present
Jerusalem, for she is in slavery with her children. 26 But the
Jerusalem above is free, and she is our mother. 27 For it is
written, “Rejoice, O barren one who does not bear; break forth
and cry aloud, you who are not in labor! For the children of the
desolate one will be more than those of the one who has a
husband.” 28 Now you, brothers, like Isaac, are children of
promise. 29 But just as at that time he who was born according to
the flesh persecuted him who was born according to the Spirit, so
also it is now. 30 But what does the Scripture say? “Cast out the
slave woman and her son, for the son of the slave woman shall
not inherit with the son of the free woman.” 31 So, brothers, we
are not children of the slave but of the free woman.
Earthly Jerusalem is correlated with earthly Jews (“according to
the flesh”). Those earthly unbelieving Jews are in slavery and will not
be heirs of God’s promise because they are not the children of
promise. Believers in Christ are the free ones who will be heirs of
God’s promise to Abraham and Isaac. Mount Zion and Jerusalem are
simply metaphors for the kingdom of God which is the Kingdom of
God in the Church of Jesus Christ!
So, when the New Testament uses the word for “inheritance,” it is
talking about the land inheritance transformed into the Kingdom of
God, which includes all creation that Christ will inherit, and we will
inherit with him because we are “in Christ.” Read these New
Testament passages on spiritualized inheritance and you will
understand why the authors stopped referring directly to a land
promise, because the Kingdom of God is our inheritance, and that
kingdom will consist of all the earth!
Ephesians 1:11–14
11
In him we have obtained an inheritance… In him you also,
when you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation,
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and believed in him, were sealed with the promised Holy Spirit,
14
who is the guarantee of our inheritance until we acquire
possession of it.
Hebrews 9:15
15
Therefore he is the mediator of a new covenant, so that those
who are called may receive the promised eternal inheritance.
Matthew 5:5
5
“Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth.
Acts 13:17–33
17
[Stephen preaching to the Jews:] “The God of this people
Israel chose our fathers…19 And after destroying seven nations
in the land of Canaan, he gave them their land as an
inheritance… 32 And we bring you the good news that what
God promised to the fathers, 33 this he has fulfilled to us their
children by raising Jesus.’”
Ephesians 1:9–14
9
according to his purpose, which he set forth in Christ 10 as a
plan for the fullness of time, to unite all things in him, things in
heaven and things on earth. 11 In him we have obtained an
inheritance…13 In him you also, when you heard the word of
truth, the gospel of your salvation, and believed in him, were
sealed with the promised Holy Spirit, 14 who is the guarantee of
our inheritance until we acquire possession of it, to the praise
of his glory.
Colossians 1:12–14
12
giving thanks to the Father, who has qualified you to share in
the inheritance of the saints in light. 13 He has delivered us
from the domain of darkness and transferred us to the kingdom
of his beloved Son, 14 in whom we have redemption, the
forgiveness of sins.
Hebrews 11:8–16
8
By faith Abraham obeyed when he was called to go out to a
place that he was to receive as an inheritance. And he went out,
not knowing where he was going. 9 By faith he went to live in the
land of promise, as in a foreign land, living in tents with Isaac and
Jacob, heirs with him of the same promise. 10 For he was looking
forward to the city that has foundations, whose designer and
builder is God… 14 For people who speak thus make it clear that
they are seeking a homeland. 15 If they had been thinking of that
land from which they had gone out, they would have had
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opportunity to return. 16 But as it is, they desire a better country,
that is, a heavenly one. Therefore God is not ashamed to be called
their God, for he has prepared for them a city.
1 Peter 1:3–4
3
According to his great mercy, he has caused us to be born
again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ
from the dead, 4 to an inheritance that is imperishable,
undefiled, and unfading, kept in heaven for you.
The New Testament has clearly transformed the notion of a
physical land inheritance for Israel into a spiritual inheritance in Christ
with an expansion of inheriting the entire earth. But Dispensationalists
still hold onto Old Testament prophecies that promise that God will
regather all the twelve earthly tribes of Israel from among the nations
into the physical land of Israel. They believe that this regathering has
yet to be fulfilled in our future. It has not happened yet in their scheme.
In the interest of keeping this narrative on target with the six-fold
promise to Abraham, I have explained how this regathering is fulfilled
in the New Testament in an added chapter at the end of this booklet,
fittingly titled, “The Regathering of Israel.”
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Conditional Covenant
Genesis 17:9
9
And God said to Abraham, “As for you, you shall keep my
covenant, you and your offspring after you throughout their
generations.”
And now we come to the part in the covenant that
Dispensationalists do not like, the conditional clause. On the one hand,
these well-meaning Christians claim the everlasting nature of the
covenant, but on the other hand they seem to miss it’s expressed
conditionality. Yes, the covenant is eternal, but to whom does it apply,
the physical or the faithful? And what price does disobedience to the
covenant bring? Jesus said it clearly in the parable of the vineyard:
Matthew 21:43
“Therefore I say to you, the kingdom of God will be taken away
from you, and be given to a nation producing the fruit of it.”
The Kingdom of God has been taken away from earthly Israel of
Torah-observant Jews and given to the true spiritual Israel, the Church
of believing Jews and Gentiles. The Kingdom of God is not tied to a
geopolitical state inheriting physical land. In fact, in the parable, Jesus
likens the ancient Jews to vinegrowers who reject the landowner and
forfeit all rights to the land:
Matthew 21:33–41
33
“Hear another parable. There was a master of a house who
planted a vineyard and put a fence around it and dug a
winepress in it and built a tower and leased it to tenants, and
went into another country. 34 When the season for fruit drew
near, he sent his servants to the tenants to get his fruit. 35 And
the tenants took his servants and beat one, killed another, and
stoned another. 36 Again he sent other servants, more than the
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first. And they did the same to them. 37 Finally he sent his son
to them, saying, ‘They will respect my son.’ 38 But when the
tenants saw the son, they said to themselves, ‘This is the heir.
Come, let us kill him and have his inheritance.’ 39 And they
took him and threw him out of the vineyard and killed him. 40
When therefore the owner of the vineyard comes, what will he
do to those tenants?” 41 They said to him, “He will put those
wretches to a miserable death and let out the vineyard to other
tenants who will give him the fruits in their seasons.”
Christians have sometimes been falsely accused of anti-semitism
because they point out the fact that the first century Jews are guilty of
rejecting Messiah and are therefore condemned by God. They say that
people who argue such things in the past used those beliefs to justify
killing Jews because as “Christ killers.”
This accusation of anti-Semitism is not only false, it is a libel and a
slander. For one, it is a non-sequitir. Just because someone quotes the
Bible as a rationalization for evil, does not mean that the Bible
condones such evil. God himself has declared the first century Jews
guilty of murdering Messiah, but he never commanded anyone to
therefore go out and kill Jews because of it.
But even more obvious and more importantly, Dispensationalists
seem to completely miss the point that it was Jesus himself who
accused the first century Jews of being his murderers! And as we will
see below, the apostles were also JEWS who condemned their own
people for rejecting the Messiah, just as the ancient JEWISH prophets
did. Those men of God were not anti-Semites, they were God’s voice
against his own people!
The point is that within the redemptive history of God, the
physical Jews would so constantly reject him, even to the point of
killing His Son, that He would take away His Kingdom from them to
give to another “people” (involving the Gentiles) who were not
originally His people, to be the inheritors of his Kingdom. Modern
Jews are not judicially guilty of killing Christ, the first century Jews
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were guilty of this crime and therefore were judged by God in the
destruction of the temple and holy city.
Acts 7:51
[Stephen:] “You men who are stiff-necked and uncircumcised
in heart and ears are always resisting the Holy Spirit; you are
doing just as your fathers did. 52 “Which one of the prophets
did your fathers not persecute? And they killed those who had
previously announced the coming of the Righteous One, whose
betrayers and murderers you have now become.
1Thessalonians 2:14
For you, brethren, ...also endured the same sufferings at the hands
of your own countrymen, even as they {did} from the Jews, 15
who both killed the Lord Jesus and the prophets, and drove us out.
They are not pleasing to God, but hostile to all men, 16 hindering
us from speaking to the Gentiles that they might be saved; with the
result that they always fill up the measure of their sins. But wrath
has come upon them to the utmost.
As these verses show, the Jews have not obeyed the conditions of the
Abrahamic covenant. They rejected Messiah so they are judged to the
utmost by God. As a result, Gentiles are now becoming God’s People.
The classic passage on the conditional nature of the covenant and
how Gentiles now fulfill God’s promises to Abraham is in Romans 11.
Romans 11:1–7
1
I ask, then, has God rejected his people? By no means! For I
myself am an Israelite, a descendant of Abraham, a member of
the tribe of Benjamin. 2 God has not rejected his people whom
he foreknew. Do you not know what the Scripture says of
Elijah, how he appeals to God against Israel? 3 “Lord, they
have killed your prophets, they have demolished your altars,
and I alone am left, and they seek my life.” 4 But what is God’s
reply to him? “I have kept for myself seven thousand men who
have not bowed the knee to Baal.” 5 So too at the present time
there is a remnant, chosen by grace. 6 But if it is by grace, it is
no longer on the basis of works; otherwise grace would no
longer be grace. 7 What then? Israel failed to obtain what it was
seeking. The elect obtained it, but the rest were hardened,
This passage is not saying that God has kept his promise to
physical descendants of Israel. It is saying that God has kept his
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promise to the remnant of Israel who are true believers. Israel as a
national entity did not obtain God’s promises, but chosen individuals
within that nation did. So God’s promise was never to the physical
many but to the faithful few. The physical many simply benefited
from being outwardly aligned with the faithful few. The people who
God is not rejecting in this passage are not physical Israel, but the
remnant believers. The rest of the Jews are hardened and do not
receive the promise because they are not true Israel.
Romans 11:11–24
11
So I ask, did they stumble in order that they might fall? By no
means! Rather through their trespass salvation has come to the
Gentiles, so as to make Israel jealous. 12 Now if their trespass
means riches for the world, and if their failure means riches for
the Gentiles, how much more will their full inclusion mean! 13
Now I am speaking to you Gentiles. Inasmuch then as I am an
apostle to the Gentiles, I magnify my ministry 14 in order
somehow to make my fellow Jews jealous, and thus save some
of them. 15 For if their rejection means the reconciliation of the
world, what will their acceptance mean but life from the dead? 16
If the dough offered as firstfruits is holy, so is the whole lump,
and if the root is holy, so are the branches. 17 But if some of the
branches were broken off, and you, although a wild olive shoot,
were grafted in among the others and now share in the
nourishing root of the olive tree, 18 do not be arrogant toward the
branches. If you are, remember it is not you who support the
root, but the root that supports you. 19 Then you will say,
“Branches were broken off so that I might be grafted in.” 20 That
is true. They were broken off because of their unbelief, but you
stand fast through faith. So do not become proud, but fear. 21 For
if God did not spare the natural branches, neither will he spare
you. 22 Note then the kindness and the severity of God: severity
toward those who have fallen, but God’s kindness to you,
provided you continue in his kindness. Otherwise you too will be
cut off. 23 And even they, if they do not continue in their
unbelief, will be grafted in, for God has the power to graft them
in again. 24 For if you were cut from what is by nature a wild
olive tree, and grafted, contrary to nature, into a cultivated olive
tree, how much more will these, the natural branches, be grafted
back into their own olive tree.
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The key to understanding this passage is that the root of the tree is
true spiritual Israel of Promise. And true Israel of Promise is not
physical Israel, the land or the natural descendants. True Israel is
simply the term for God’s people—whoever they are. The natural
branches represent physical descendants of Israel, while the wild olive
branches represent Gentiles who believe. The conditional nature is
emphasized here as Paul says that the physical earthly Jews were cut
off because of their unbelief. Faith is the root, not physical descent.
Jews are rejected by God and cut off for disobeying the covenant.
They are grafted back in by faith, just as Gentiles are grafted on by
faith. A Jew gets saved, becomes God’s chosen, the same way as a
Gentile does: through faith in Christ, not physical descent. No
physical or geopolitical Israel is here in mind. True Israel is the
faithful, not the physical, the heavenly, not the earthly. Always was,
always is, always will be.
The following conclusion of the passage has, in the eyes of some,
reinforced that God has a special plan for physical Israel still:
Romans 11:25–31
25
I do not want you to be unaware of this mystery, brothers: a
partial hardening has come upon Israel, until the fullness of the
Gentiles has come in. 26 And in this way all Israel will be
saved, as it is written, “The Deliverer will come from Zion, he
will banish ungodliness from Jacob”; 27 “and this will be my
covenant with them when I take away their sins.” 28 As regards
the gospel, they are enemies for your sake. But as regards
election, they are beloved for the sake of their forefathers. 29
For the gifts and the calling of God are irrevocable. 30 For just
as you were at one time disobedient to God but now have
received mercy because of their disobedience, 31 so they too
have now been disobedient in order that by the mercy shown to
you they also may now receive mercy.
Even if one takes this to be a reference to physical Israel, the
context of the whole passage necessitates that God will show his
electing mercy on the physical Jew the same way he does so on the
Gentile -- through faith in Christ, not through an Old Covenant that is
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obsolete. God may very well cause a major revival of faith in the
Jewish community in the future, but he will not do it apart from faith
in Christ. He will not reinstitute ceremonial laws of Jewish separation
and with it, a physical land promise and temple sacrifice, because
these have already been fulfilled in Christ and there is no longer Jew
or Gentile separation in Christ. Once the old is gone, it is gone
forever. There is no returning.
Hebrews 8:13
When He said, “A new covenant,” He has made the first
obsolete.”
If this Romans 11 passage means that God will save a mass of
Jews in the future, he will do it through faith in Jesus Christ, not
through a land grab which has been fulfilled already in Christ, or
through returning to an obsolete understanding of physical land
promise and national separation. To return to a nationalistic prejudice
would be to negate the entire internationalism of the New Covenant. It
would be a denial of the Gospel itself.
But in point of fact, I do not believe that this future revival of
ethnic Israel is what Romans 11 is teaching. Paul is simply explaining
the nature of the Gospel under the New Covenant.
Remember, earlier in this same passage, Paul differentiated
between ethnic Israel and true Israel of faith by the concept of the
remnant. He wrote that God does not reject his people Israel, but then
he defines just exactly who those people Israel are, and they are not the
ethnic descendants, but rather those within ethnic Israel who are true
believers! The remnant are true Israel, the remnant are the ones who
God does not reject. The remnant are the “elect” or “chosen” faithful.
Genetic descent is the outward vehicle by which God creates the line
for Messiah, but only the elect within that covenanted group obtain
salvation by God’s grace. The rest are hardened and do not receive it.
Ethnic Jewishness gives no one status as the people of God.
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So when Paul writes about the root and the branches with the
branches being broken off because of unbelief, he is saying that
faithless ethnic Israel rejects Messiah so that God can offer the Gentiles
[nations] the same faith salvation that true faithful Israelites had.
Paul is referring to true Israel (of faith), both Jew and Gentile,
when he writes, “and thus [‘in this way’] all Israel will be saved.” He
is not saying that all ethnic Israel will be saved after God finishes
saving all the Gentiles he was planning to save. Paul is saying that the
New Covenant is the fullness of the nations, and that “in this way”
both Jew and Gentile will be saved—by faith in Christ.
The Deliverer coming from Zion to remove ungodliness and
taking away sins is the first coming of Jesus, not the second. The
second coming is when Jesus brings judgment, not forgiveness.
So what does Paul mean when he says, “The gifts and calling of
God are irrevocable”? The Dispensationalist argues that this means
that God does not revoke his promises to Israel. And with that
assertion, I would agree. BUT who is he referring to? All of ethnic
Israel? May it never be! He explicitly speaks of “election.” It is the
elect within ethnic Israel whose calling and gifts are irrevocable. And
those “elect” are the remnant of believers, not the physical
descendants. Remember, that we pointed out earlier in this passage of
Romans 11 that Paul claims the elect or chosen “remnant” are the true
believers within ethnic Israel. The Greek word for “chosen” in that
passage on the remnant is the same as the Greek word for “election”
earlier in the same chapter.
So “partial hardening” does not refer to a temporary time of
hardening, but to a portion of the people being hardened. This means
that some of Israel did believe in Messiah. And these are the Israel
that are saved [which includes believing Gentiles]. A partial
hardening has happened to ethnic Israel so that God would bring the
fullness of the nations (Gentiles), through faith, in with true Israel of
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faith. This is how God saves all Israel, all true Israel [both Jew and
Gentile], as opposed to all ethnic Israel.
Romans 9:6–8
6
For not all who are descended from Israel belong to Israel, 7
and not all are children of Abraham because they are his
offspring, but “Through Isaac shall your offspring be named.” 8
This means that it is not the children of the flesh who are the
children of God, but the children of the promise are counted as
offspring.
“All Israel” in Romans 11:26 is not a term referring to ethnic
Israel, but a term that refers to elect Jew and Gentile believers in
Christ. These elect remnant believers are the “all Israel” that are saved
with the coming of the New Covenant in Jesus.
This difficult bouncing back and forth that Paul does in reference
to ethnic Israel and spiritual Israel may have caused confusion over
the years in biblical interpretation, but it is a common biblical
technique. Jesus bounces back and forth in his definition of “offspring
of Abraham.”
John 8:37–40
37
I know that you are offspring of Abraham; yet you seek to
kill me because my word finds no place in you. 38 I speak of
what I have seen with my Father, and you do what you have
heard from your father.” 39 They answered him, “Abraham is
our father.” Jesus said to them, “If you were Abraham’s
children, you would be doing the works Abraham did.”
First, Jesus says Abraham is their father, then he says Abraham is
not their father, but Satan is. Jesus is not contradicting himself, he is
merely making a distinction between ethnic descendency and true
spiritual descendency. This kind of bouncing back and forth in
definitions is exactly what Paul did in Romans 11. It may cause
difficulty, but God never said it would be easy to discern the words of
truth. We must study the Bible in its Near Eastern cultural context to
show ourselves approved, not merely interpret things in our 21st
century Western hyper-literalism. And if it’s one thing that the New
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Testament has made clear, it is that ethnic Israel as a whole did not
obey the Old Covenant. They did not believe in the Messiah that the
Old Covenant promised, so they forfeited their birthright as a whole.
However, there was a remnant within that earthly whole that did obey
and believe in Messiah. That Remnant received the promise to
Abraham, because Abraham’s children are those of faith, not flesh.
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7
Circumcision
Genesis 17:10
10
This is my covenant, which you shall keep, between me and
you and your offspring after you: Every male among you shall
be circumcised.
In this conclusion of God’s Promise to Abraham, we see that he
seals the covenant with the act of circumcision. The thing to
understand is that the physical act of circumcision was never the
guarantee for physical Jews to inherit the promise. It was a physical
sign of the spiritual circumcision that truly justifies a person.
In the New Testament, we are going to see that this was the point,
but ironically, even in the Old Testament, God already stated that
physical circumcision was not what determined a true Israelite, but
spiritual circumcision.
Deuteronomy 30:6
6
And the LORD your God will circumcise your heart and the
heart of your offspring, so that you will love the LORD your
God with all your heart and with all your soul.
Jeremiah 4:4
Circumcise yourselves to the LORD; remove the foreskin of
your hearts, O men of Judah and inhabitants of Jerusalem; lest
my wrath go forth like fire, and burn with none to quench it,
because of the evil of your deeds.”
4
Jeremiah 9:25–26
25
“Behold, the days are coming, declares the LORD, when I
will punish all those who are circumcised merely in the flesh—
26
…for all these nations are uncircumcised, and all the house
of Israel are uncircumcised in heart.”
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Israel in Bible Prophecy
We see in these Old Covenant passages that God already hints at
the fact that to be disobedient to His covenant was to be
uncircumcised of heart, which is the same as the uncircumcised
heathen around them. In the New Covenant, this distinction is made
more clearly by Paul as he tells us in Romans 3 that the circumcision
God meant all along was spiritual circumcision of the heart. A “true
Jew” is one who is circumcised of heart which means that a Gentile
who believes is a true Jew but an earthly or ethnic Jew who does not
believe is actually an uncircumcised heathen:
Romans 2:28–29
28
For no one is a Jew who is merely one outwardly, nor is
circumcision outward and physical. 29 But a Jew is one inwardly,
and circumcision is a matter of the heart, by the Spirit, not by the
letter. His praise is not from man but from God.
Colossians 2:11
11
In him also you were circumcised with a circumcision made
without hands, by putting off the body of the flesh, by the
circumcision of Christ,
According to the New Covenant, the baptized believing Gentile is
circumcised of heart, which is what God had meant all along when he
commanded circumcision. It is the believer (Jew and Gentile) that is
the descendant of Abraham who is circumcised of heart and therefore
receives the sign and seal of the covenant eternally promised by God.
Paul furthers this argument in Romans 4 when he proves that
circumcision of heart (faith) is the seal that God was referring to when
he declared Abraham righteous. Physical circumcision was merely an
outward sign of the inward reality.
Romans 4:9–13
9
Is this blessing then only for the circumcised, or also for the
uncircumcised? For we say that faith was counted to Abraham
as righteousness. 10 How then was it counted to him? Was it
before or after he had been circumcised? It was not after, but
before he was circumcised. 11 He received the sign of
circumcision as a seal of the righteousness that he had by faith
while he was still uncircumcised. The purpose was to make
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him the father of all who believe without being circumcised, so
that righteousness would be counted to them as well, 12 and to
make him the father of the circumcised who are not merely
circumcised but who also walk in the footsteps of the faith that
our father Abraham had before he was circumcised. 13 For the
promise to Abraham and his offspring that he would be heir of
the world did not come through the law but through the
righteousness of faith.
Paul’s’ point is that physical circumcision is not the deal, it is the
seal of a deal already made through faith. To be physically
circumcised means that you should be spiritually circumcised of heart,
but if you are not, then you are not circumcised in truth. The
unbeliever’s circumcision becomes uncircumcison.
So, you see how circumcision of heart actually fulfills God’s
original intentions? It is not that he made physical circumcision the
key in the Old Covenant and then changed it with the New Covenant,
it is that God all along meant circumcision of heart by the Spirit to be
the true covenantal sign and seal, of which fleshly circumcision was
only an outward picture. So the New Covenant does not change the
meaning of circumcision, but rather illuminates its true meaning.
But Dispensationalists think that there are Scriptures that appear
to support the notion that God still has a place in his plan for physical
Israel. Romans 2:1-4 is one of them.
Romans 3:1–4
1
Then what advantage has the Jew? Or what is the value of
circumcision? 2 Much in every way. To begin with, the Jews
were entrusted with the oracles of God. 3 What if some were
unfaithful? Does their faithlessness nullify the faithfulness of
God? 4 By no means!”
On first blush it may appear that God still holds earthly Israel as
special in His eyes or that he remains “faithful” to earthly Israel. But in
context, this is clearly not what He is talking about. This exclamation
that God’s faithfulness is not nullified by some unbelief is referring to
God’s faithfulness to the remnant spiritual believers within earthly
Israel. In other words, God keeps his covenant because of the faithful
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few and only to the faithful few. Just because some do not believe does
not mean that God will then withdraw from the faithful. God remains
faithful to physically circumcised believing Jews, who are Abraham’s
descendants, along with believing Gentiles. This is not an exception for
earthly Israel, this is a definition of true Israel, and true Israel includes
both believing Gentiles and believing Jews.
Conclusion
As we have walked through each of the six elements of God’s
promise to Abraham and his offspring, we have seen that each and
every one of them are not merely fulfilled spiritually in New Covenant
faith, but that is what God had intended all along. 1) Abraham is a
father of many nations through faith because the Gentiles are included
through faith along with believing Jews; 2) The Children of Abraham
have always been those who believe like Abraham did, not those who
are born of flesh; 3) The everlasting covenant remains everlasting
because it is fulfilled in Christ who is able to save those who draw
near to him by faith, not because it is a deed to a piece of land in the
Middle East; 4) The Promised Land is fulfilled in Jesus as we rest
from our works in faith and inherit the earth. God does not deal with
physical plots of land to separate his people from the nations because
now, people from every nation are his people and God is international,
respecting no land boundaries. All separation laws between Jew and
Gentile have been abolished in Christ; 5) The covenant was
conditional upon obedience, so Jesus took the inheritance away from
those first century unbelieving Jews to open it up to Gentiles; 6) and
God always intended spiritual circumcision as the sign and seal of the
covenant, not mere physical circumcision. So faith accomplishes
spiritual circumcision for believers, and unbelief operates as
“uncircumcision” to physically circumcised Jews who reject Messiah.
Many Christians want modern day geopolitical Israel to still be
God’s Chosen People, as if they are still the center of God’s prophetic
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plan for the future. They claim that God’s Promise to Abraham is still
in effect with physical Israel. But in attributing such a false identity to
modern Israel, they are negating the Gospel of salvation by grace
through faith in Jesus Christ, that applies all of Abraham’s promise
spiritually and truly to Christ and then to those who believe in Christ.
But wait, there’s more!
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8
The Temple
Another problem with the Dispensational obsession with physical
earthly Israel is an equally disturbing obsession with the physical
earthly temple in Jerusalem. Popular talk of the Red Heifer, the Ark of
the Covenant and other political events surrounding Jerusalem and the
temple mount, reveals a belief that the rebuilding of a physical temple
in Jerusalem will presage the Second Coming of Christ, who will, in
some hybrid fashion, reinstitute the laws of sacrifice that were
abolished under the New Covenant. This bizarre retro scenario does
not merely defy the imagination, it defies the Scriptures! If God were
to reinstitute the temple with its sacrifices, he would be denying his
own once-for-all sacrifice made by Christ (Heb 7:27, 9:12, 26).
Despite the fact that the New Testament nowhere says that the
physical temple will be rebuilt, there is the promise of an
eschatological temple in Ezekiel 40-48. Futurists (those who believe
the last days are in our future) assume it is a physical temple, though
the description of that temple is in a vision of obvious spiritual
symbols, such as a trickle of living water, becoming an uncrossable
river that flows out of the temple into the sea, turning the entire sea
into freshwater (Ezke 47:1-12). Milton Terry, renowned expert on
Biblical Apocalyptics concludes,
Ezekiel’s temple is no more explicable as a model of real
architecture than are his cherubim and wheels possible in
mechanics…this vision of restored and perfected temple,
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service, and land symbolizes the perfected kingdom of God and
his Messiah.”1
In line with Terry’s messianic interpretation of Ezekiel’s
eschatological temple, the Messiah is prophesied to build that temple:
Zechariah 6:12–13 (ESV)
12
And say to him, ‘Thus says the LORD of hosts, “Behold, the
man whose name is the Branch: for he shall branch out from
his place, and he shall build the temple of the LORD. 13 It is he
who shall build the temple of the LORD and shall bear royal
honor, and shall sit and rule on his throne.” ’
In the New Testament, Jesus is revealed as that “branch of Jesse”
(Acts 13:22-23). So, Jesus, as Messiah, is the builder of the
eschatological temple. But what kind of temple is it? The answer is to
be found in the cornerstone.
The cornerstone of a temple is the “perfect” foundational stone
upon which a temple is based. It is usually buried in the corner of the
building, and all the rest of the structure is built upon it’s perfect
angles and measurements. The biblical prophecies describe that
perfect cornerstone of the eschatological temple as Messiah himself:
Isaiah 28:16 (ESV)
16
therefore thus says the Lord GOD, “Behold, I am the one who
has laid as a foundation in Zion, a stone, a tested stone, a
precious cornerstone, of a sure foundation: ‘Whoever believes
will not be in haste.’
Now, is that a spiritual metaphor or not? Obviously the text is not
promising that the body of Messiah would literally be buried in the
ground of a physical temple as its cornerstone. So if the very
cornerstone of the eschatological temple is spiritual, then the entire
temple, that is based upon it, would have to be a spiritual temple, not a
physical one.
1
Milton S. Terry, Biblical Apocalyptics: A Study of the Most Notable Revelations of God and of Christ in
the Canonical Scriptures (New York; Cincinnati: Eaton & Mains; Curts & Jennings, 1898), 131.
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Acts 4:11 (ESV)
11
This Jesus is the stone that was rejected by you, the builders,
which has become the cornerstone.
Isaiah 8:14 (ESV)
14
And he will become a sanctuary and a stone of offense and a
rock of stumbling to both houses of Israel, a trap and a snare to
the inhabitants of Jerusalem.
The Jews who rejected that cornerstone of the new temple would be
judged when God came and destroyed their physical temple to replace it
with the spiritual one in AD 70 (Matt 21:40-43). The simple biblical fact
is: the new temple of God in the New Covenant era is not an earthly
temple built with hands, but a heavenly one built by the Spirit.
But don’t take my word for it, the apostles who wrote the
Scriptures also told us that the temple was transformed into the
spiritual reality of Jesus Christ himself. Jesus is the New Temple.
John 1:14
14
And the Word became flesh and dwelt [tabernacled] among
us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from
the Father, full of grace and truth.
In this passage, Jesus is described using the term for tabernacle,
which was the precursor to the temple. As argued above, the “New
Jerusalem” is a spiritual metaphor for the New Covenant (Heb 12:22–
24; Gal 4:22–31). In that New Covenant “city,” there is no physical
stone temple, because Jesus is God’s true and spiritual temple:
Revelation 21:22
22
And I saw no temple in the city [New Jerusalem], for its
temple is the Lord God the Almighty and the Lamb.
This revelation of the New Jerusalem in Revelation is not a future
reality, but a present one. New Jerusalem is the New Covenant (Heb
12:22) described as a spiritual building.
The apostle Paul makes that spiritual temple connection crystal
clear when he speaks of the new holy temple of God, “being built on
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the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus himself being
the cornerstone” (Eph 2:20).
Ephesians 2:19–22
19
So then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are
fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of
God, 20 built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets,
Christ Jesus himself being the cornerstone, 21 in whom the
whole structure, being joined together, grows into a holy
temple in the Lord. 22 In him you also are being built together
into a dwelling place for God by the Spirit.
The new temple of God here is not a physical one rebuilt with stone,
but a spiritual house consisting of the body of Christ. This is not mere
“spiritualizing,” as if it doesn’t have any tangible reality. No, the Church
of Jesus Christ is a real presence of people in this world, and it is the true
presence of Jesus Christ as well, not a mere metaphor. In the Bible,
“spiritualization” does not mean something is any less real, in fact, it is in
some ways more real. The Body of Christ as God’s “spiritual” temple is a
very real and tangible presence of God on the earth.
Peter affirms this same notion of the body of Christ being God’s
“spiritual” holy temple in this new covenant.
1 Peter 2:4–6
4
As you come to him, a living stone rejected by men but in the
sight of God chosen and precious, 5 you yourselves like living
stones are being built up as a spiritual house, to be a holy
priesthood, to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God
through Jesus Christ. 6 For it stands in Scripture: “Behold, I am
laying in Zion a stone, a cornerstone chosen and precious, and
whoever believes in him will not be put to shame.”
2 Corinthians 6:16
For we are the temple of the living God; as God said, “I will
make my dwelling among them and walk among them, and I
will be their God, and they shall be my people.
16
Scholar Richard Bauckham points out that during the Jerusalem
council of Acts 15, James describes an eschatological temple that God
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prophesies to rebuild as being the body of Christ, consisting of
believing Gentiles added to believing Jews.
Acts 15:13–17
13
After they finished speaking, James replied, “Brothers, listen
to me. 14 Simeon has related how God first visited the Gentiles,
to take from them a people for his name. 15 And with this the
words of the prophets agree, just as it is written, 16 “ ‘After this
I will return, and I will rebuild the tent [“dwelling”] of
David that has fallen; I will rebuild its ruins, and I will
restore it, 17 that the remnant of mankind may seek the Lord,
and all the Gentiles who are called by my name, says the Lord,
who makes these things
“The interpretation takes ‘the dwelling of David’ to be the
eschatological temple which God will build, as the place of his
eschatological presence, in the messianic age when Davidic
rule is restored to Israel. He will build this new temple so that
all the Gentile nations may seek his presence there.”2
So there is a rebuilt temple after all. And God is rebuilding that
temple right now. But it is a heavenly temple, with Christians as living
stones (1Pet 2:5)—as opposed to dead rocks—and apostles and
prophets as foundation and pillars (Eph 2:20), and Jesus Christ as the
cornerstone (1Cor 3:11; Eph 2:20). Jesus Christ is the new temple and
high priest of that true heavenly temple/tabernacle (Heb 9:11, 23-24)!
Not only that, but the Church is also the holy priesthood that
ministers the atonement of God to the world through the Gospel. There
is no longer a physical Jewish priesthood before God. In fact, God calls
the Church his chosen race, a holy nation, people for his own
possession, all terms that were applied to Israel in the Old Covenant.
1 Peter 2:9–10
9
But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a
people for his own possession, that you may proclaim the
excellencies of him who called you out of darkness into his
2
Richard Bauckham, “James and the Jerusalem Church,” in The Book of Acts in Its First Century Setting:
The Book of Acts in Its Palestinian Setting, ed. Richard Bauckham and Bruce W. Winter, vol. 4 (Grand
Rapids, MI; Carlisle, Cumbria: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company; The Paternoster Press, 1995),
453–454.
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marvelous light. 10 Once you were not a people, but now you
are God’s people; once you had not received mercy, but now
you have received mercy.
The physical temple of stone in Jerusalem was a weak physical
shadow of the true heavenly temple explained in Hebrews 8 through
10. It would be sacrilege to suggest that God would return to an
inferior physical shadow after the perfect spiritual reality has come.
Christ has made his once for all sacrifice. It would be an abomination
and denial of the New Covenant to return to the Old Testament
priesthood and sacrifices. The book of Hebrews calls that return to the
Old “apostasy” (Heb 6:4-8).
The total desolation of the earthly temple in AD 70 was God’s
way of saying the last days of the Old Covenant had arrived, the
consummation of the ages was here (Heb 9:26), the Old Covenant and
its priesthood and sacrificial system was obsolete (Heb 8:13). The
New Heavenly Jerusalem and Zion has come out of heaven and
replaced the old physical Jerusalem and Zion (Heb 12:22-24; Rev 21).
If the current geopolitical nation of Israel ever does rebuild the
temple, it will be a spiritually dead carcass of an obsolete letter of
death, rather than a living reminder of a spiritually alive reality (1 Cor
3). Though I suspect there is a reason why God has never let the
earthly temple be rebuilt. It is his way of historically verifying that the
Old Covenant is obsolete and can never be reinstituted.
Let the writer of Hebrews have the final word on the temporary
nature of the earthly physical tabernacle/temple embodying the Old
Covenant, versus the permanent eternal nature of the heavenly temple
embodying the New Covenant.
Hebrews 8:1–7
1
Now the point in what we are saying is this: we have such a
high priest, one who is seated at the right hand of the throne of
the Majesty in heaven, 2 a minister in the holy places, in the
true tent that the Lord set up, not man… 6 But as it is, Christ
has obtained a ministry that is as much more excellent than the
old as the covenant he mediates is better, since it is enacted on
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better promises. 7 For if that first covenant had been faultless,
there would have been no occasion to look for a second.
The author of Hebrews then concludes that this “second”
covenant or heavenly temple is not historically consummated until the
physical temple is destroyed. “The Holy Spirit is signifying this, that
the way into the holy place has not yet been disclosed while the outer
tabernacle is still standing” (Heb 9:8 NASB95).
The book of Hebrews was written before the temple was destroyed
in AD 70. The writer and his Christian audience knew the desolation
was coming because Jesus had foretold it (Matt 23:37-24:1). They were
in a transition period between covenants. The New Covenant had been
spiritually inaugurated at Christ’s death, resurrection and ascension. But
the earthly elements of the Old Covenant were still standing. The Old
Covenant was becoming obsolete as the New Covenant was taking its
place. The Old Covenant was about to finally and fully vanish away—
when the earthly incarnation of that Old Covenant was destroyed: the
holy city and temple.
Hebrews 8:13
13
In speaking of a new covenant, he makes the first one
obsolete. And what is becoming obsolete and growing old is
ready to vanish away.
Hebrews was written in a transition period. In an earthly sense,
the New Covenant had been inaugurated, but not consummated until
the Old Covenant had been completely done away by the destruction
of the earthly incarnation of that Old Covenant. When the Roman
armies destroyed the earthly city of Jerusalem and its temple, that
marked God historically consummating the New Covenant that he had
previously spiritually inaugurated. I explain this in much more detail
in my book End Times Bible Prophecy: It’s Not What They Told You.
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9
Blessing and Cursing
So none of the promises to Abraham can possibly refer to
physical Israel in the current national climate because it is all fulfilled
in Christ and the New Covenant. The physical nation of Israel is not
God’s Chosen People, the church of Jesus Christ is the “Israel of God
(Gal 6:16), God’s Chosen People from every nation on earth. The
promise that Dispensationalists use from the Old Testament to refer to
blessing and cursing of physical Israel is actually a promise related to
true spiritual Israel, the Church of God.
Genesis 12:3
“I will bless those who bless you, And the one who curses you
I will curse. And in you all the families of the earth shall be
blessed.”
This is part of the same Promise God made to Abraham. The
phrase “in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed” is a
connective phrase to the original promise made to Abraham. We have
already shown how this has been fulfilled in the New Testament
Church of Jesus Christ, so the blessing and cursing is not upon those
who bless and curse physical Israel, but upon those who bless and
curse spiritual Israel, the Body of Christ.
America was founded on Christianity. As it dismantles its
Christian roots, it departs from this blessing, and so it will lose God’s
favor. America is not blessed because it has blessed Israel. Israel is
blessed because it has blessed America, at one time, a country based
on a Christian worldview. This is not to say that America is the
Promised Land or any such nonsense. It is simply saying that America
was blessed because it reverenced God as the Church followed Christ
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Israel in Bible Prophecy
and grew in its midst (remember the “Remnant”?). America was
blessed long before the modern state of Israel was founded in 1948. Of
course, as America departs from its Christian roots, as the last vestiges
of Christianity in our justice, political, social and economic systems
disappear, we will learn what it is like to lose God’s favor. May God
bless America because America has blessed the Lord and His Church.
But may God have mercy on us as we depart from His ways.
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10
The Regathering of Israel
One of the reasons why Dispensationalists believe that the
promise of a physical land to earthly Israel remains intact is the
repeated prediction by most all of the Old Testament prophets of a
“regathering” of the twelve tribes of Israel back to the Land by
Messiah. It’s also called “the restoration of Israel.” Though earthly
Israel had been exiled and scattered to the ends of the earth (Diaspora)
because of their disobedience to Yahweh, nevertheless, he would one
day bring them all back into the land promised to their forefather,
Abraham. The “lost ten tribes” of the Assyrian exile, collectively
known as Israel (the northern kingdom) now in the Diaspora all over
the earth, would one day come back and be united with Judah (the
southern kingdom, including Benjamin). These returning exiles will
be called “the remnant,” and Messiah will be their shepherd and king.
Here are a few of the many passages reiterating this important
prophecy:
Ezekiel 36:24
I will take you from the nations and gather you from all the
countries and bring you into your own land.
Amos 9:9–15
9
“For behold, I will command, and shake the house of Israel
among all the nations as one shakes with a sieve…14 I will
restore the fortunes of my people Israel, and they shall rebuild
the ruined cities and inhabit them;…15 I will plant them on their
land, and they shall never again be uprooted.
Micah 2:12
I will surely assemble all of you, O Jacob; I will gather the
remnant of Israel; I will set them together like sheep in a fold.
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Isaiah 11:10–12
In that day the Lord will extend his hand yet a second time to
recover the remnant that remains of his people, from Assyria,
from Egypt, from Pathros, from Cush, from Elam, from Shinar,
from Hamath, and from the coastlands of the sea. 12 He will
raise a signal for the nations and will assemble the banished of
Israel, and gather the dispersed of Judah from the four corners
of the earth.
This regathering of the remnant of Israel is so often repeated in the
Old Testament, it is surely one of the most significant themes of God’s
promises to His people. Because the Dispensationalist prioritizes Old
Covenant earthly Israel over the New Covenant spiritual Israel (the
Church of Jew and Gentile), he thinks this is an event that has yet to
happen in our future. Sure, he says, some Jews believed in Jesus in the
first century; sure, Israel became a modern state in 1948, with Jews
coming back from amongst “all the nations.” But, as a whole, they have
yet to embrace Jesus the Messiah, so that regathering and restoration
must be in our future—all according to their theology.
This interpretation is a spiritually dangerous one for Christians to
have. Why? Because it completely ignores the New Covenant, and in
some ways denies it. It operates as if Jesus did not fulfill the very
prophecies that the New Testament said he did.
A closer look at the full context of each of these passages reveals
several interwoven elements of the prophecy that New Testament
apostles and writers claim are fulfilled in the New Covenant: 1) The
regathering of the twelve tribes would occur with the coming of
Messiah; 2) It would be a new covenant; 3) It would involve a remnant
of true believers out of the rest of unbelieving Israel; 4) It would also
include Gentiles along with Jews; and 5) God would dwell in their
midst. All these elements above constitute the definition of the New
Covenant that Jesus the Messiah accomplished in his death,
resurrection, ascension and establishment of his kingdom. To deny that
God has fulfilled these promises, is tantamount to denying the Gospel.
It is no wonder that some Christian Zionists are telling Christians to not
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try to convert unbelieving Jews to Messiah Jesus. Why should we, they
reason, since earthly Jews are still God’s people and they will
eventually believe in Jesus later in their end times scheme? This is
madness based on a bizarre hermeneutic of hyperliteralism that
misconstrues every one of the five elements of the regathering against
the Gospel they are supposed to believe upon.
Let’s take a closer look at just a few of these passages of the
regathering and see how the New Testament says they are fulfilled in
the first century inauguration of the New Covenant Gospel.
Acts and the Beginning of the Restoration
In Acts 2, we read about the first explosion of the Gospel with the
first baptism of the Holy Spirit. It was the thing that Jesus had told
them to wait for, which would launch them into all the world with the
Good News (Acts 1:4). Pentecost would be the historical inauguration
of the heavenly New Covenant achieved by the death, resurrection and
ascension of Christ. It would be the pouring out of God’s Spirit upon
his people (Isa 32:12-19; 44:5; Ezek 36:25-28; 37:14).
The disciples asked Jesus if this was the time of the restoration of
Israel (1:6), the very thing we have been discussing in this work. Jesus
told them that the restoration of Israel would begin occurring when the
Holy Spirit came upon them, but they were not to worry themselves
with the timing (1:8).
And what was the restoration, but the pouring out of God’s Spirit
and the regathering of Jews from all over the known earth in a
spiritual metaphorical resurrection? (Ezek 37). So when the disciples
were baptized with the Spirit at Pentecost and began to speak in
foreign tongues, that was the fulfillment of God’s pouring out of his
Spirit. Pouring is a form of baptizing (Heb 9:10, 13, 19, 21). But it
was also the beginning of the regathering of Jews because “there were
dwelling in Jerusalem Jews, devout men from every nation under
heaven” (Acts 2:5). The list of nations that are described (Acts 2:9-11)
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just happens to be a representative sampling of the seventy nations of
Genesis 10. To the ancient Jew, those seventy were “all the nations” to
which the Jews were scattered (Amos 9:9). According to the apostle
Luke, Pentecost of AD 30 was transformed into the beginning of the
gathering of Jews from all the nations.
And that gathering of Jews included the Gentiles. It was a
gathering of two bodies into one that was occurring all throughout the
book of Acts. Notice these passages that say that the evangelism of
Acts is the very fulfillment of the promise to gather the Gentiles with
the Jews as his people:
Acts 15:13–19 (ESV)
13
After they finished speaking, James replied, “Brothers, listen
to me. 14 Simeon has related how God first visited the Gentiles,
to take from them a people for his name. 15 And with this the
words of the prophets agree, just as it is written.
Acts 26:23 (ESV)
[Paul:] 23 that the Christ must suffer and that, by being the first
to rise from the dead, he would proclaim light both to our
people and to the Gentiles.”
The “ingathering” was based upon the unity of belief in Jesus as
Messiah. Isaiah had prophesied that when Messiah first came (the
branch of Jesse), in that very day, the Lord would “recover the
remnant that remains of his people,” from all the nations. “In that
day,” the root of Jesse would be “raised (resurrected) as a signal for
the nations,” and would “assemble the banished of Israel and gather
the dispersed of Judah from the four corners of the earth” (Isa 11:1-2,
10-12). According to the prophecy, the gathering of the remnant and
the Gentiles would occur at the first coming of Messiah, when Jesus
was resurrected, not the second coming. In that day of Messiah’s
arrival and resurrection (his raising as a signal), he would draw both
the remnant of Israel as well as Gentile believers. This will not start in
our future, it already started in the book of Acts! Paul likened that
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raising of the signal to Christ’s resurrection, and confirmed this
Isaianic promise as already being fulfilled during his ministry:
Romans 15:8–9, 12
8
For I tell you that Christ became a servant to the circumcised
to show God’s truthfulness, in order to confirm the promises
given to the patriarchs, 9 and in order that the Gentiles might
glorify God for his mercy…12 And again Isaiah says, “The root
of Jesse will come, even he who arises to rule the Gentiles; in
him will the Gentiles hope.
What were the promises given to the patriarchs that Paul says
were confirmed (“verified”) in Christ’s resurrection? All of them,
including the regathering (Acts 3:24; 32; 15:13-15; 24:24; 26:6). In
fact, most of the prophecies about the regathering of Israel almost
always add the inclusion of Gentiles as a simultaneous event (See
more below). But the point is that the book of Romans says explicitly
that the Isaianic prophecy about the gathering of the remnant along
with the Gentiles was already being fulfilled in his own day. This is
not an eschatological system demanding something must be fulfilled
in the future, this is the New Testament itself saying the prophecy was
fulfilled in the first century, in that day.
One of the ways that Dispensationalists seek to deny the fulfillment
of the regathering is to suggest that the inclusion of the Gentiles has
been fulfilled in Christ, but the gathering of Israel has not yet been
fulfilled. They argue that “confirmation” of promises to the patriarchs is
not the same as “fulfillment.” God only verified the promises to Israel,
not fulfilled them. They see this split because they do not see an earthly
nation called Israel regathered into the land in the way that they expect
it to be. But their problem is that, as we have seen, the gathering of the
Jews was simultaneous with the gathering of the Gentiles. If we return
to Acts 2, the holy Scripture says again that both the gathering and
Gentile inclusion were being fulfilled in their day.
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They Were in the Last Days of the Old Covenant
Back to Pentecost. Peter then preaches a sermon about how they
were in the last days as Joel described, a time when the “Day of the
Lord” was coming for Israel. That Day of the Lord was the destruction
of Jerusalem and the temple in AD 70. This has to be the case because
Peter clearly states that the “last days” and “Day of the Lord” of Joel
were being fulfilled in AD 30, not in a distant future (Acts 2:16. See
my book End Times Bible Prophecy for the details on this). There
could be no more explicit claim of Joel 2 being fulfilled in their day
than Peter saying, “This is what was uttered through the prophet Joel.”
(Acts 2:16). This is what was uttered. Not, “this will be,” or “this is
like what will be.” This is what was uttered.
Then he describes Joel’s words about God’s spirit poured out,
wonders in the heavens, and the Day of the Lord. Some modern
interpreters say that only the Spirit outpouring was fulfilled. But Peter
says all of it was being fulfilled, and they were about to see the Day of
the Lord. Peter does not quote the entire prophecy. Not because he is
only quoting what was fulfilled but because they were only at the
beginning of the fulfillment of that entire prophecy, which was a
seamless and integrated whole. And guess what? If you look at that
Joel prophecy in more detail, it includes this little gem right after
Peter’s quoted section:
Joel 3:1
“For behold, in those days and at that time, when I restore the
fortunes of Judah and Jerusalem.
So Peter quotes Joel’s prophecy that links the restoration to the last
days and the Spirit outpouring, that Peter said was being fulfilled in their
very midst, leading to the Day of the Lord (the destruction of Jerusalem
and the temple). Christians tend to assume that the “Day of the Lord” is a
reference to a universal end of time judgment. But in the Bible, it is not.
In the Bible, it is used of local judgments by God on nations, peoples or
cities (Zeph 1:7-15; Isa 13:6-19). The Day of the Lord Peter refers to is
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not the worldwide universal judgment, but the localized national and city
judgment of God upon Jerusalem that Jesus had also prophesied (Matt
23:37-24:2; 21:37-45; 22:1-9; Luke 19:41-44).
The apostles knew they were in the last days in the first century.
They said so without ambiguity (Heb 1:1; 9:26; 1Pet 1:20; 4:7; 1Cor
10:11; 1Jn 2:18; 4:3). The New Testament explicitly states that the first
century were the last days. Therefore, they could not have been the last
days of the whole world, but the last days of the Old Covenant.1
And part of those last days of the Old Covenant was the
regathering of Israel at the coming of Messiah. When Messiah comes
the first time (not the second time), he will regather Israel and be a
light to the nations. Isaiah makes that link in chapter 49:
Isaiah 49:6–8
6
he says: “It is too light a thing that you should be my servant
to raise up the tribes of Jacob and to bring back the preserved
of Israel; I will make you as a light for the nations… Thus says
the LORD: “In a time of favor I have answered you; in a day of
salvation I have helped you; I will keep you and give you as a
covenant to the people, to establish the land, to apportion the
desolate heritage.
First, notice that bringing back the preserved of Israel was about
making them as a light for the nations or Gentiles. That phrase was a
messianic one. When the old man Simeon, filled with the Holy Spirit
saw the infant Jesus in the temple, he quoted Isaiah 49:
Luke 2:30–32
30
for my eyes have seen your salvation 31 that you have
prepared in the presence of all peoples, 32 a light for revelation
to the Gentiles, and for glory to your people Israel.”
When the Jews had rejected the apostle Paul’s preaching of the
Gospel, he concluded that Isaiah 49 was being fulfilled in his ministry
of the Gospel to the Gentiles:
1
See “Chapter 9: End of the Age/Last Days,” Brian Godawa, End Times Bible Prophecy: It’s Not What
They Told You (Embedded Pictures, 2017), 70-80.
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Acts 13:46–47
46
And Paul and Barnabas spoke out boldly, saying, “It was
necessary that the word of God be spoken first to you. Since you
thrust it aside and judge yourselves unworthy of eternal life,
behold, we are turning to the Gentiles. 47 For so the Lord has
commanded us, saying, “ ‘I have made you a light for the
Gentiles, that you may bring salvation to the ends of the earth.’ ”
So the New Testament says that Isaiah 49:6-8 was being fulfilled
in the first century coming of Messiah. But is that only one half of the
prophecy fulfilled? The Acts 13 passage only mentions the Gentile
inclusion, not the regathering of Israel. Dispensationalists believe that
Jesus is the light to the Gentiles now, but that the time of gathering of
Israel, her time of salvation, is yet in our future. There’s only one
problem: Paul disagrees with them. Paul writes to the Corinthians and
quotes Isaiah 49 again by saying that Israel’s time of salvation
(another phrase for the regathering) was happening in his day!
2 Corinthians 6:1–2
1
Working together with him, then, we appeal to you not to
receive the grace of God in vain. 2 For he says, “In a favorable
time I listened to you, and in a day of salvation I have helped
you.” Behold, now is the favorable time; behold, now is the day
of salvation.
If we go back to the Isaiah passage that Paul is quoting, we see
that the “favorable time of salvation” includes the regathering to the
Land!
Isaiah 49:8 (NASB95)
Thus
says
the
LORD, “In a
favorable time
I
have answered You, And in a day of salvation I have helped
You; And I will keep You and give You for a covenant of the
people, To restore the land, to make them inherit the desolate
heritages;
Restoring the land and inheriting the desolate heritages is
precisely the fulfillment of God’s Promise to restore them to the Land
of their inheritance. But the New Testament authors are claiming that
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the restoration is a spiritual return in Messiah, not a physical return to
a physical land.
We need to put aside our own modern biased assumptions of how
fulfillment operates and seek to understand what the meaning of
fulfillment is to the New Testament apostles and prophets. If they say
it was fulfilled, then we need to adjust our definition of fulfillment to
their definition of fulfillment. And all too often the hyperliteralism of
modern Dispensationalism interprets prophecies in a literal manner,
when they are clearly poetic metaphors or spiritual interpretations of
the ancient Hebrew.
But as we continue through Acts 2, we see that poetic and
spiritual fulfillment even more so.
The Throne of David
After saying that the last days were being fulfilled in their midst,
Peter describes Jesus as being seated on the throne of David at his
resurrection and subsequent ascension to God’s right hand.
Acts 2:30–33
30
Being therefore a prophet, and knowing that God had sworn
with an oath to him that he would set one of his descendants on
his throne, 31 he foresaw and spoke about the resurrection of the
Christ, that he was not abandoned to Hades, nor did his flesh see
corruption. 32 This Jesus God raised up, and of that we all are
witnesses. 33 Being therefore exalted at the right hand of God.
What is important about this fulfillment is that the New
Testament apostle said that Jesus was enthroned as the Son of David
at his resurrection and ascension, not in a future day from ours. This
is crucial because the Old Testament prophecies said that the Son of
David would be enthroned at the time of the gathering of the remnant!
Ezekiel 37:7–14
Behold, I will take the people of Israel from the nations among
which they have gone, and will gather them from all around,
and bring them to their own land… 24 “My servant David shall
be king over them, and they shall all have one shepherd.
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Ezekiel 34:11–24
11
“For thus says the Lord GOD: 12 As a shepherd seeks out his
flock when he is among his sheep that have been scattered, so
will I seek out my sheep, and I will rescue them from all places
where they have been scattered. 13 And I will bring them out
from the peoples and gather them from the countries, and will
bring them into their own land…23 And I will set up over them
one shepherd, my servant David, and he shall feed them: he
shall feed them and be their shepherd.
The reference here to David is obviously a spiritual symbol of
Messiah. David will not literally raise from the dead, but rather, a Son
of David, that is, one from his lineage would be enthroned as a
Davidic figure of salvation: Messiah! Jesus will not reign from an
earthly throne of David in the future, he is already reigning right now
on David’s throne in heaven! (Eph 1:20-23).
Hyperliteralists want to believe that Jesus will sit on an earthly
throne of David in the geographical earthly city of Jerusalem in our
future. But Peter, the apostle of God, declares, with God’s own
authority, that Jesus was seated on David’s throne at his ascension.
And Ezekiel says that that enthronement occurs at the time of the
regathering of Israel and the inclusion of the Gentiles into one people
with one shepherd and king (Jeremiah repeats the same gathering of
the remnant at the kingship of Messiah in Jer 23:3-6).
Again, this making of the two peoples, Jew and Gentile, into one
people has already been declared by Jesus and his apostles to have
been fulfilled. Jesus surely alludes to this Ezekiel prophecy when he
refers to Gentiles as “sheep not of the fold” of Israel that he would
make one with the Jews:
John 10:16
16
And I have other sheep that are not of this fold. I must bring
them also, and they will listen to my voice. So there will be one
flock, one shepherd.
Jesus claimed that he was the fulfillment of Ezekiel’s shepherd
bringing Jew and Gentile into one flock. But more importantly, the
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apostle Paul writes that this making of Gentiles one with Jews
(through faith – Ephesians 2:8) already occurred through Christ’s
death and resurrection. Ezekiel’s prophecy about the gathering of Jews
and Gentiles from all the nations into the one fold of God’s sheep is
the Gospel of Jesus Christ! Ephesians says that regathering is fulfilled
in the Church of Jesus Christ: Jew and Gentile, one in Christ.
Ephesians 2:13–15
13
But now in Christ Jesus you [Gentiles] who once were far off
have been brought near by the blood of Christ. 14 For he
himself is our peace, who has made us both one and has broken
down in his flesh the dividing wall of hostility 15 by abolishing
the law of commandments expressed in ordinances, that he
might create in himself one new man in place of the two, so
making peace.
To finish up my brief look at the book of Acts, let’s look at
another sermon by Peter in Acts 15. In this case, he is speaking to
fellow Christians who were struggling with Judaizers who were
demanding Gentiles obey the laws of Moses in order to be God’s
people. The apostle James then quotes from the prophet Amos to
justify the Gentile inclusion:
Acts 15:13–19
13
James replied, “Brothers, listen to me. 14 Simeon has related
how God first visited the Gentiles, to take from them a people
for his name. 15 And with this the words of the prophets agree,
just as it is written, 16 “ ‘After this I will return, and I will
rebuild the tent of David that has fallen; I will rebuild its ruins,
and I will restore it, 17 that the remnant of mankind may seek
the Lord, and all the Gentiles who are called by my name, says
the Lord, who makes these things 18 known from of old.’ 19
Therefore my judgment is that we should not trouble those of
the Gentiles who turn to God,
The rebuilding of the tent or tabernacle of David is another poetic
metaphor of the regathering of Israel by Messiah (Jesus). But notice
how that metaphor is tied inextricably to the inclusion of the Gentiles?
The two are always together. God will draw remnant Israel from the
nations and unite them with the Gentile believers. James does not say
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that the inclusion of the Gentiles is fulfilled, but the rebuilding of
David’s tabernacle is not fulfilled. He quotes the whole of the unit as
fulfilled. He says explicitly that God taking Gentiles as a people for his
name was the fulfillment of the restoration of Israel and the remnant,
which together is the rebuilding of the Davidic reign of Messiah.
Here is the original prophecy from Amos that James quoted.
Notice how the regathering of Israel from the nations and its
restoration is part of a unified whole including the Gentiles.
Amos 9:9–15
9
“For behold, I will command, and shake the house of Israel
among all the nations as one shakes with a sieve…11 “In that day
I will raise up the booth of David that is fallen and repair its
breaches, and raise up its ruins and rebuild it as in the days of
old, 12 that they may possess the remnant of Edom and all the
nations who are called by my name,”… 14 I will restore the
fortunes of my people Israel, and they shall rebuild the ruined
cities and inhabit them;…15 I will plant them on their land, and
they shall never again be uprooted out of the land that I have
given them,” says the LORD your God.
So, why does the New Testament say nothing about the Jews in a
physical land? Because the Gospel of the Kingdom of God has
transformed the physical land of Israel into all the earth, as we
explained in chapter 5, and because the “desire” of Abraham and the
prophets for a homeland was revealed in the New Testament to be
fulfilled in a heavenly land, city and temple, not physical ones.
Notice in this first passage of Hebrews 11 how the physical land
of promise is described as Abraham’s “inheritance.”
Hebrews 11:8–10
8
By faith Abraham obeyed when he was called to go out to a
place that he was to receive as an inheritance. And he went out,
not knowing where he was going. 9 By faith he went to live in
the land of promise, as in a foreign land, living in tents with
Isaac and Jacob, heirs with him of the same promise. 10 For he
was looking forward to the city that has foundations, whose
designer and builder is God.
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The writer of Hebrews then explains that the land promised as an
inheritance, this same land promised to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, is
spiritualized or transformed in the New Testament into the inheritance
of a heavenly city and heavenly land of the New Covenant (Heb 9:15).
Hebrews 11:14–16
14
For people who speak thus make it clear that they are seeking a
homeland. 15 If they had been thinking of that land from which
they had gone out, they would have had opportunity to return. 16
But as it is, they desire a better country, that is, a heavenly one.
Therefore God is not ashamed to be called their God, for he has
prepared for them a city [a heavenly city Heb 12:22-24).
In the New Testament, the holy land is a heavenly land, not an
earthly one; the holy city Jerusalem is a heavenly city, not an earthly
one; the holy temple is a heavenly temple, not an earthly one. Old
Covenant earthly shadows find their heavenly realities in New
Covenant spirituality (Hebrews 8:5-13). The New Testament
transforms the land promise into the new covenant in Christ.
The claim by so-called literalists that “spiritualizing” prophecies
is not a legitimate hermeneutic (interpretation) is grossly unbiblical.
The New Testament “spiritualizes” all over the place. The sacrifice of
Christ on the cross as the “lamb of God” was a spiritualization of the
sacrifice of physical lambs in the earthly temple. Jesus was a
spiritualized David, not the literal earthly David (Acts 13:34-37). The
Body of Christ is the spiritualized temple of God (Eph 2:19-22). And
the New Testament claims that the New Covenant Church of united
Jew and Gentile believers is also in fact the spiritualized reality of the
land promise. Mount Zion, Jerusalem and the temple of the Old
Covenant have all been spiritualized into the New Covenant reality of
the heavenly Mount Zion, heavenly Jerusalem and heavenly temple.
Hebrews 12:22–24
22
But you have come to Mount Zion and to the city of the
living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and to innumerable angels
in festal gathering, 23 and to the assembly of the firstborn who
are enrolled in heaven, and to God, the judge of all, and to the
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spirits of the righteous made perfect,
mediator of a new covenant.
24
and to Jesus, the
Ephesians 2:19–22
19
So then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are
fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of
God [temple], 20 built on the foundation of the apostles and
prophets, Christ Jesus himself being the cornerstone, 21 in
whom the whole structure, being joined together, grows into a
holy temple in the Lord. 22 In him you also are being built
together into a dwelling place for God by the Spirit.
According to the New Testament, the New Covenant Church is
the heavenly land of promise. The New Covenant Church is the
heavenly city Jerusalem. The body of Christ on earth is the rebuilt
heavenly temple. The New Covenant is the new heavens and earth, a
Scriptural covenantal metaphor (2 Cor 5:17). See my book End Times
Bible Prophecy for an explanation of the new heavens and earth.
Ezekiel 37: Resurrection, Regathering, Restoration
But notice one thing at the end of the Ephesians passage above. It
says that In Christ, we are “being built up together into a dwelling
place for God the Spirit.” Not only is this a description of the Church
of Jesus Christ as the new holy temple of God on earth, but it is
another reference to the prophetic fulfillment of the gathering of Israel
and Gentiles as the New Covenant. Follow me on this.
In another place, Paul makes the same spiritual temple analogy of
God’s dwelling. But notice, he now makes a deliberate quotation from
the Old Testament:
2 Corinthians 6:16
16
For we are the temple of the living God; as God said, “I will
make my dwelling among them and walk among them, and I
will be their God, and they shall be my people.”
Jeremiah 31:31-33 equates this dwelling amidst God’s people as the
New Covenant. But Ezekiel 37-38 also equates that New Covenant
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dwelling with the regathering of Israel. These elements are all part of the
same package. Let’s take a look at that prophecy in a bit more detail.
Ezekiel 37:7-14 describes a vision that Ezekiel was given about
the regathering and restoration of Israel depicted as a massive
resurrection. Then in his further explanation of everything that
restoration entailed, he writes this from the mouth of God:
Ezekiel 37:21–28
21
then say to them, Thus says the Lord GOD: Behold, I will
take the people of Israel from the nations among which they
have gone, and will gather them from all around, and bring
them to their own land. 22 And I will make them one nation in
the land, on the mountains of Israel. And one king shall be king
over them all, and they shall be no longer two nations, and no
longer divided into two kingdoms… 24 “My servant David shall
be king over them, and they shall all have one shepherd. They
shall walk in my rules and be careful to obey my statutes. 25
They shall dwell in the land that I gave to my servant Jacob,
where your fathers lived. They and their children and their
children’s children shall dwell there forever, and David my
servant shall be their prince forever. 26 I will make a covenant
of peace with them. It shall be an everlasting covenant with
them. And I will set them in their land and multiply them, and
will set my sanctuary in their midst forevermore. 27 My
dwelling place shall be with them, and I will be their God, and
they shall be my people. 28 Then the nations will know that I
am the LORD who sanctifies Israel, when my sanctuary is in
their midst forevermore.”
In an expansion of that prophecy earlier in the text, God adds
another promise that he will place his spirit within them and give them
a heart of flesh to replace their heart of stone (remember the
“outpouring of the Spirit” fulfilled in Acts?).
Ezekiel 36:24–28
24
I will take you from the nations and gather you from all the
countries and bring you into your own land. 25 I will sprinkle
clean water on you, and you shall be clean from all your
uncleannesses, and from all your idols I will cleanse you. 26 And
I will give you a new heart, and a new spirit I will put within
you. And I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and
give you a heart of flesh. 27 And I will put my Spirit within you,
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and cause you to walk in my statutes and be careful to obey my
rules. 28 You shall dwell in the land that I gave to your fathers,
and you shall be my people, and I will be your God.
On every level, this entire prophecy is about the arrival of the New
Covenant, not some distant future reinstitution of the Old Covenant
shadows of physical temple and land. Each of the prophecy’s constituent
elements are fulfilled in the New Testament Scriptures at the time of the
first century. Let’s take a look at those elements:
1. The gathering of Israel from all the nations (v. 21): This was
already explained above as starting to occur in AD 30 at Pentecost
(Acts 2). The New Covenant fulfilled in the first century.
2. One nation with one king, David (v. 24-25): It was already
detailed above that this messianic reference was Jesus seated on
David’s throne at his resurrection and ascension (Acts 2:30-33) and
uniting his sheepfolds (Jn 10:16). That’s the New Covenant fulfilled in
the first century.
3. The everlasting covenant of peace with Israel (v. 26): The
New Testament says that this everlasting covenant of peace is the New
Covenant brought through Christ fulfilled in the first century.
Hebrews 13:20
20
Now may the God of peace who brought again from the dead
our Lord Jesus, the great shepherd of the sheep, by the blood of
the eternal covenant,
Colossians 1:20
20
and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether
on earth or in heaven, making peace by the blood of his cross.
4. God’s dwelling place shall be with them (v. 27-28): In
multiple places in the New Testament the Church of believers in Jesus
are described as God’s temple (1Cor 3:16-17; Eph 2:19-22), but Paul
explicitly quotes the Ezekiel prophecy of the regathering and God’s
dwelling as fulfilled in the New Covenant Church beginning in the
first century.
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2 Corinthians 6:16
16
What agreement has the temple of God with idols? For we
are the temple of the living God; as God said, “I will make my
dwelling among them and walk among them, and I will be their
God, and they shall be my people.
5. Remove the heart of stone, replace with a heart of flesh
(36:26): Paul wrote that this promise of heart replacement was
fulfilled in the arrival of the New Covenant of Christ fulfilled in the
first century.
2 Corinthians 3:3
3
And you show that you are a letter from Christ delivered by
us, written not with ink but with the Spirit of the living God,
not on tablets of stone but on tablets of human hearts.
6. God will put his Spirit in them and causing them to obey
(36:27)
7. He will be their God and they will be His people (36:27):
Not only does the Old Testament link these two phrases to the New
Covenant (Jer 31:31-34), but the New Testament also claims this
promise was fulfilled beginning in the first century with the arrival of
the New Covenant.
Ephesians 1:13
13
In him you also, when you heard the word of truth, the
gospel of your salvation, and believed in him, were sealed with
the promised Holy Spirit. (see also Jn 7:37-39, 1Cor 6:19)
Hebrews 8:6–13
6
“Behold, the days are coming, declares the Lord, when I will
establish a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the
house of Judah… I will put my laws into their minds, and write
them on their hearts, and I will be their God, and they shall be
my people…13 In speaking of a new covenant, he makes the
first one obsolete. And what is becoming obsolete and growing
old is ready to vanish away.
Notice how the Holy Spirit-authorized writer of Hebrews says
right up front that the promise to the house of Israel and Judah is
fulfilled in the arrival of the New Covenant in the first century, not in
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a future time yet to come. God places his Spirit in all believers in
Jesus, they are his people of the New Covenant.
Dispensationalists claim that the gathering of the Gentiles occurred
with the coming of Jesus but not the promised gathering of Judah and
Israel, which has yet to take place. But the New Testament over and over
again claims that the New Covenant fulfills that promise to Judah and
Israel of their gathering. If the New Testament claims a prophecy has
been fulfilled, then it is literally anti-biblical to deny that fulfillment.
Ezekiel 36-37 is pregnant with motifs and promises of the New
Covenant arrival of Messiah, not a second coming and reinstitution of
Old Covenant shadows. It is important to remember that the Old
Testament contains no theology of the second coming of Messiah. It’s
all about the first coming for them. The second coming is a New
Testament doctrine, not an Old Testament one. The whole point to the
prophets was that when Messiah came, he would fulfill the promises
and usher in the messianic age to come. The New Covenant is that
messianic age, complete with Jesus seated on the throne of David
(Eph 1:20-23), the regathering of Israel, and the inclusion of the
Gentiles, the pouring out of God’s Spirit, the new eternal covenant,
the replacement of stoney hearts with flesh and God causing his
people to walk in his statutes. The whole package is fulfilled in Christ.
So when Christians read these prophecies as if they are intended to be
split into pieces of fulfillment, the last of which will occur at a second
coming of Christ, they are quite simply imposing their preconceived
theology onto the text that has already been fulfilled instead of reading
it within its original Old Covenant context.
So the natural question arises: How is it that the gathering of
Israel could have occurred in the first century, when in fact most of the
nation rejected Jesus and even crucified him? That leads us to the
theology of the remnant.
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The Remnant
So far, I have deliberately avoided a very big qualification in all
this talk of the regathering of Israel into the Land. The promise of
gathering all the scattered tribes of Israel (and Gentiles) from all the
nations sounds like a huge number that would be visibly apparent in
history. This causes some to conclude that therefore this event has not
happened yet. But that interpretation is based on a false assumption
that God meant all members of the tribes who were scattered, when he
only meant a remnant of them. A remnant is a small number out of the
whole. That small number was who God was always concerned about.
And the helpful thing about it is, he told us this many times in those
same prophecies of the ingathering (Amos 9:12; Isa 11:11; Micah 4:1,
7)! Here are just two of them:
Hosea 1:10–11, 2:23
10
Yet the number of the children of Israel shall be like the sand
of the sea, which cannot be measured or numbered. And in the
place where it was said to them, “You are not my people,” it
shall be said to them, “Children of the living God.” 11 And the
children of Judah and the children of Israel shall be gathered
together, and they shall appoint for themselves one head…23
and I will sow her for myself in the land. And I will have
mercy on No Mercy, and I will say to Not My People, ‘You are
my people’; and he shall say, ‘You are my God.’ ”
Isaiah 10:20–22
20
In that day the remnant of Israel and the survivors of the
house of Jacob will no more lean on him who struck them, but
will lean on the LORD, the Holy One of Israel, in truth. 21 A
remnant will return, the remnant of Jacob, to the mighty God. 22
For though your people Israel be as the sand of the sea, only a
remnant of them will return.
Again, notice that the gathering of the remnant and the gathering
of the Gentiles (“not my people”) are linked together as one event. But
the point of it all is that God’s promises to Israel as a nation were
always made to the remnant of true believers, not to the unbelieving
Israelites. What? you may say. It doesn’t say “believers vs.
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unbelievers.” It just says a remnant. That is true. But as we dig deeper,
you will see that this remnant is ultimately defined and fulfilled in the
New Testament as the true faithful followers of Yahweh. In the same
way that Christians often say that just because you belong to a church
does not mean you are saved, so in the days of the Old Covenant,
belonging to physical earthly Israel did not mean you were the Chosen
People of Abraham’s children. This is what Paul meant when he
wrote, “For not all who are descended from Israel belong to Israel, and
not all are children of Abraham because they are his offspring”
(Romans 9:6–7). It is only “those who are of faith who are the sons of
Abraham” (Gal 3:7), not those who are of the flesh (Gal 4:28-31).
Jesus made this same point that unbelieving Jews were not
actually Abraham’s children because they did not believe in him as
Messiah. In fact, he called them the exact opposite of children of
Abraham. He called them children of the devil (Jn 8:39-44). You read
that right. Jesus called physical offspring of Abraham who did not
accept him as Messiah children of the devil.
According to the New Testament, God’s promises were always to
the faithful, not to the nation as a whole. The rest of the nation merely
benefited, went along for the ride, because they were physically with
the remnant whom God was blessing.
This theology of the remnant is explained by Paul in Romans 11.
He describes the story of Elijah and the prophets of Ba’al on Mount
Carmel. Elijah despairs because, with typical prophetic hyperbole, he
exclaims that he alone is the only faithful Jew left in an Israel of
idolaters. God tells him that he is not. That in fact, God still has seven
thousand men who did not bow the knee to Ba’al (Rom 11:1-4).
Paul then concludes,
Romans 11:5–7 (ESV)
5
So too at the present time there is a remnant, chosen by grace.
6
But if it is by grace, it is no longer on the basis of works;
otherwise grace would no longer be grace. 7 What then? Israel
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failed to obtain what it was seeking. The elect obtained it, but
the rest were hardened.
So, here we see Paul saying that “at the present time,” during his
life ministry, there was a remnant of elect chosen out of Israel. And
who are those remnant? Obviously Christian believers in Jesus chosen
by God’s grace through the Gospel (Eph 2:8-10).
But Paul goes farther than merely saying there is a remnant, he
actually concludes that that remnant of believers are the remnant of
the regathering of Israel prophesied in the very passages of Hosea and
Isaiah we quoted above!
Romans 9:25–27
23
in order to make known the riches of his glory for vessels of
mercy, which he has prepared beforehand for glory— 24 even
us whom he has called, not from the Jews only but also from
the Gentiles? 25 As indeed he says in Hosea, “Those who were
not my people I will call ‘my people,’ and her who was not
beloved I will call ‘beloved.’ ” 26 “And in the very place where
it was said to them, ‘You are not my people,’ there they will be
called ‘sons of the living God.’ ” 27 And Isaiah cries out
concerning Israel: “Though the number of the sons of Israel be
as the sand of the sea, only a remnant of them will be saved
According to Paul, the regathered remnant of the last days
prophesied by Isaiah and Hosea and the prophets is the unity of Gentile
and Jewish believers in Christ, the mystery of the Gospel occurring at
that very moment in history (Eph 3:6). The root of “Israel” in Romans 11
is that remnant of the spiritually faithful, it is not the physical or earthly
nation called Israel. Remember, “not all who are descended from Israel
belong to Israel” (Rom 9:6-7). Unbelieving earthly Jews are cut off like
branches from the root of spiritual Israel, and Gentile believers are
grafted onto that spiritual root through faith (Rom 11:13-24). So when he
writes that “all Israel will be saved,” he is not referring to the physical
earthly nation we call Israel, but rather, the spiritual remnant of faithful
believers, both Jew and Gentile.
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Right after this definition of the remnant, Paul quotes another
messianic prophecy that is about the first coming of Messiah.
Romans 11:26–27
26
And in this way all Israel will be saved, as it is written, “The
Deliverer will come from Zion, he will banish ungodliness
from Jacob”; 27 “and this will be my covenant with them when
I take away their sins.”
Those who think this “Israel” is an earthly geopolitical nation
rather than the spiritually faithful remnant have to make that verse
apply to a future second coming of Christ. But their problem is that it
is the first coming of Messiah bringing the New Covenant that saves
both Jew and Gentile alike through faith. And remember, the theology
of the remnant proves that God was not speaking of the physical
earthly descendants of Abraham, he was talking of the true spiritual
Israel; believers in Messiah. The covenant that takes away Israel’s sins
is the New Covenant (Jer 31:31-34). All Israel being saved is not a
future prophecy of an earthly nation, it is the declaration of the
Gospel: “In this way [of faith in Messiah], all Israel [both Jew and
Gentile believer] will be saved.”
So, if it is only a remnant who are saved, what happens to the rest
of unbelieving Israel? Jesus and the apostles are clear in their
proclamation that the rest of the Jewish nation will be judged and cast
out from the New Covenant kingdom. That judgment consisted of the
destruction of their holy city and temple (See my End Times Bible
Prophecy for a full explanation of this destruction).
Isaiah foretold this destruction of unbelieving Jews in correlation
with the ingathering of the remnant at the feast of Messiah’s kingdom
(the New Covenant).
Isaiah 65:8–16
8
Thus says the LORD: …So I will do for my servants’ sake,
and not destroy them all… 11But you who forsake the LORD…
12
I will destine you to the sword, and all of you shall bow down
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to the slaughter, because, when I called, you did not answer;
when I spoke, you did not listen,…“Behold, my servants shall
eat, but you shall be hungry; behold, my servants shall drink,
but you shall be thirsty; behold, my servants shall rejoice, but
you shall be put to shame;… 15 You shall leave your name to
my chosen for a curse, and the Lord GOD will put you to death,
but his servants he will call by another name [Christian].
Jesus told three parables that echoed this Isaianic motif of
destruction/remnant/feast in the coming desolation of Jerusalem and
the temple in AD 70. God delivers his remnant and destroys the rest.
The parable of the tenants describes the first century Jews (tenants of
the vineyard) killing God’s son. Jesus concludes that God (the owner
of the vineyard) will come and “he will put those wretches to a
miserable death and let out the vineyard to other tenants who will give
him the fruits in their seasons” (Matt 21:41).
In the parable of the wedding feast, Jesus compared the kingdom
of God to a wedding feast of a king, and the Gospel to the invitation
for that feast. But the first century Jewish unbelievers did not accept
the wedding invitation (the Gospel), and instead killed God’s servants
who called them (prophets and apostles). He concludes, “The king
was angry, and he sent his troops and destroyed those murderers and
burned their city [Jerusalem].” Then the king (God) said to his
servants (Jewish believers), ‘The wedding feast is ready, but those
invited were not worthy’” (Matt 22:7-8). He then offers the invite to
anyone they could find (the Gentiles).
The third parable of the master of the house has Jesus likening
unbelieving Jews to those who think that they know God but who
actually do not, and would be rejected at the coming kingdom feast
(the New Covenant consummation). That kingdom feast is considered
as part of the gathering of the remnant from the four corners of the
earth (Isa 43:5-7).
Luke 13:27–29
27
But he will say, ‘I tell you, I do not know where you come
from. Depart from me, all you workers of evil!’ 28 In that place
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there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth, when you see
Abraham and Isaac and Jacob and all the prophets in the
kingdom of God but you yourselves cast out. 29 And people
will come from east and west, and from north and south, and
recline at table in the kingdom of God. (see also Matt 8:11-12)
These parables all reinforce Jesus’ prediction of the AD 70 temple
destruction in his Olivet Discourse:
Matthew 23:37–24:2 (ESV)
37
“O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the city that kills the prophets and
stones those who are sent to it! How often would I have
gathered your children together as a hen gathers her brood
under her wings, and you were not willing! 38 See, your house
is left to you desolate…1 Jesus left the temple and was going
away, when his disciples came to point out to him the buildings
of the temple. 2 But he answered them, “You see all these, do
you not? Truly, I say to you, there will not be left here one
stone upon another that will not be thrown down.”
The apostle Paul reinforced this casting off of unbelieving Israel
when he told his own allegory of Abraham’s children from two
different wives, Sarah and Hagar in Galatians 4:21-31. As already
explained above in chapter 3 on the children of Abraham, Paul likened
unbelieving Jews of the first century to mere Old Covenant children of
the flesh, but not inheritors of the Promise to Abraham in the New
Covenant (v. 24-26). The children of promise (the remnant) he
describes as the Jewish believers in Jesus, who were presently being
persecuted by the unbelieving Jews of his day (v. 30-31). The Jewish
Christians were the children of the free woman, and the unbelieving
Jews were children of the slave woman. And those unbelieving Jews
would be cast out from the inheritance of the kingdom of God
(inheritance as a metaphor for the Land promise), while the remnant
alone would inherit the kingdom.
Galatians 4:30–31
30
But what does the Scripture say? “Cast out the slave woman
and her son, for the son of the slave woman shall not inherit
with the son of the free woman.” 31 So, brothers, we are not
children of the slave but of the free woman.
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So God’s delivery of the remnant was always tied to the gathering
of Israel, as well as the ingathering of the Gentiles, as well as the
judgment of the rest of unbelieving Jews and their casting out. God
would bring in his New Covenant kingdom, judge those Jews who
rejected Messiah by destroying their city and temple, but rescue his
remnant believers (Christians). This is exactly what happened in AD
70 when Roman armies destroyed Jerusalem and the Christians
escaped to the mountains.
For a detailed comparison of all the Old Testament prophecies of
the gathering of the remnant of Israel fulfilled in the New Testament,
see my Matthew 24 Fulfilled: Biblical and Historical Sources. It is a
compendium of my notes on Matthew 24 and the Last Days.
The 144,000
Interpreting the book of Revelation is a complex task. To focus on any
one element is sure to raise a dozen questions about other aspects of the
apocalypse and its interwoven tapestry of events and theology. But I
wanted to finish this chapter on the gathering of the remnant by addressing
its presence in the eschatological conclusion of the New Testament.
I subscribe to a preterist interpretation of Revelation. That means
that I believe its main purpose is not to speak of the end of time or end
of the world, but rather to declare the final judgment upon the Jews for
rejecting and murdering their Messiah (Rev 1:7), and to affirm the
divorce of Old Covenant Israel with God’s marriage to the New
Covenant bride of Christ (Rev 21). This is achieved through the
prediction of the desolation of Jerusalem and the temple by the Roman
armies of Titus in AD 70. By destroying the earthly elements of the
Old Covenant, God was dissolving that Old Covenant and replacing it
with the New Covenant in real historical time. Therefore, the apostle
John was warning the Jewish Christians, who he considered God’s
chosen remnant, the symbolic 144,000, to get out of Jerusalem and out
of the surrounding cities before the wrath of God arrived on the
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unbelievers. This view is explained in more detail in my book, End
Times Bible Prophecy: It’s Not What They Told You.
Within this context, the 144,000 from the twelve tribes, is the
consummating fulfillment of the regathering of remnant believing
Israel.
Revelation 7:2–4
2
Then I saw another angel ascending from the rising of the sun,
with the seal of the living God, and he called with a loud voice
to the four angels who had been given power to harm earth and
sea, 3 saying, “Do not harm the earth or the sea or the trees,
until we have sealed the servants of our God on their
foreheads.” 4 And I heard the number of the sealed, 144,000,
sealed from every tribe of the sons of Israel:
Revelation 14:1, 4
Then I looked, and behold, on Mount Zion stood the Lamb,
and with him 144,000 who had his name and his Father’s name
written on their foreheads…4 It is these who follow the Lamb
wherever he goes. These have been redeemed from mankind as
firstfruits for God and the Lamb.
1
It is beyond the scope of this booklet to exegete all the details of
this passage. But let me just point out that the sealing of the 144,000
represents God’s ownership and protection over them in contrast with
the condemned who are sealed with the Mark of the Beast (Rev 13:1618). The reference to the twelve tribes indicates not only that this is the
regathering of the remnant out of Mount Zion/Jerusalem (Isa 37:31-32),
but that they are the Jewish Christians in Israel who were protected
from the wrath that was coming upon the land and city in AD 70. They
were the ones who fled to the mountains to escape the abomination of
desolation, just as Jesus had told them to (Matt 24:15-21). The 144,000
are also described as “first-fruits for God and the Lamb” (14:4), a
phrase that indicates they were the first Christian converts of that
generation who were in Jerusalem (Acts 2).
This remnant of course is not exhaustive, for the text right after
this gathering then adds the inclusion of the Gentiles, that other
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element so often found together with the regathering in Old Testament
prophecies.
Revelation 7:9–14
9
After this I looked, and behold, a great multitude that no one
could number, from every nation, from all tribes and peoples
and languages, standing before the throne and before the Lamb,
clothed in white robes, with palm branches in their hands, 10
and crying out with a loud voice, “Salvation belongs to our
God who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb!”…And he said to
me, “These are the ones coming out of the great tribulation.
They have washed their robes and made them white in the
blood of the Lamb.
Followers of Jesus the Lamb “from every nation and tribe” means
“from the Gentiles.” There it is again. The regathering of Israel’s true
remnant believers alongside the ingathering of the Gentiles to make one
unity in the body of Christ (Eph 3:4-6). The regathering of Israel and
the ingathering of the Gentiles are almost always spoken of as being
together. In other words, they are two sides of one activity of God. He
does not separate them in time as the Dispensationalist claims. They are
two actions of one Gospel.
But the 144,000 came out of the “great tribulation.” Many
Christians read this with their preconceived bias that the tribulation is
an event in our future. But their problem is that the Scripture says the
tribulation is actually in our past. The apostle John had written that
the great tribulation was already going on in the first century, and he
was a partaker in it with Gentile Christians all over the empire
(especially the churches of Asia Minor – Rev 2-3).
Revelation 1:9
I, John, your brother and partner in the tribulation and the
kingdom…
You can’t get any more biblical than that. The Apostle John saying
that he was going through the Tribulation as he wrote the book of
Revelation! The Tribulation is not in our future. It was in John’s day.
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It so happens, that during that time that John was writing,
approximately AD 65, the Neronic persecution of Christians was in
full tilt, which was followed by the Roman invasion and destruction of
the land of Israel, its holy city Jerusalem and temple in AD 70.
Wait a second. Didn’t Jesus say the Tribulation was “such as has
not been from the beginning of the world until now, no, and never will
be”? How could John have been referring to the first century if that
was not the greatest of all historical tribulations?
The answer is quite simple. The phrase is common ancient
Hebrew hyperbole that was used to describe the spiritual ramifications
of an historical event. Daniel used the same exact phrase when he
described the first destruction of Jerusalem and the temple in 586 BC.
Daniel 9:12 (ESV)
For under the whole heaven there has not been done anything
like what has been done against Jerusalem.
Ezekiel also used the same hyperbole when describing the same
destruction of city and temple:
Ezekiel 5:9 (ESV)
And because of all [Israel’s] abominations I will do with you
what I have never yet done, and the like of which I will never
do again.
Does God contradict himself? Was the first destruction of the city
and temple any greater than the destruction of the city and temple in
AD 70? Of course not. It was a way of describing the same kind of
spiritual devastation that occurred in both time periods. This is akin to
our saying, “I’ve never seen anything like it!” when in fact, we have.
There is nothing more serious in its spiritual ramifications than the
destruction of the incarnation of God’s covenant with Israel.
Flee to the Mountains
But that’s not all. Because Jesus said something right before he
warned about the great tribulation that was coming within the lifetime
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of his hearers (Matt 23:36; 24:34). He told the Jewish Christians who
lived in Judea to flee to the mountains.
Matthew 24:16–20 (ESV)
16
then let those who are in Judea flee to the mountains. 17 Let
the one who is on the housetop not go down to take what is in
his house, 18 and let the one who is in the field not turn back to
take his cloak. 19 And alas for women who are pregnant and for
those who are nursing infants in those days! 20 Pray that your
flight may not be in winter or on a Sabbath.
Fleeing to the mountains would be of no effect in our modern
world, where there is no geographical “safe space” in Israel. But in the
first century, when the Romans were surrounding Jerusalem with their
armies, there was. It would make sense for Christians to get out of the
city and flee to the mountains to avoid the wrath about to come.
And that’s exactly what they did. Reputable ancient Church
historian, Eusebius tells us:
But the people of the church in Jerusalem had been
commanded by a revelation, vouchsafed to approved men there
before the war, to leave the city and to dwell in a certain town
of Perea called Pella. And when those that believed in Christ
had come thither from Jerusalem, then, as if the royal city of
the Jews and the whole land of Judea were entirely destitute of
holy men, the judgment of God at length overtook those who
had committed such outrages against Christ and his apostles,
and totally destroyed that generation of impious men.2
This all fits with a “preterist” interpretation of the book of
Revelation as being fulfilled in our past. Revelation’s main purpose is
not to speak of the end of time or end of the world, but rather to declare
the final judgment upon the Jews for rejecting and murdering their
Messiah (Rev 1:7), and to affirm the divorce of Old Covenant Israel
with God’s marriage to the New Covenant bride of Christ (Rev 21).
This was achieved through the desolation of Jerusalem and the temple
2
Eusebius of Caesaria, “The Church History of Eusebius,” in Eusebius: Church History, Life of
Constantine the Great, and Oration in Praise of Constantine, ed. Philip Schaff and Henry Wace, trans.
Arthur Cushman McGiffert, vol. 1, A Select Library of the Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers of the
Christian Church, Second Series (New York: Christian Literature Company, 1890), 138.
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by the Roman armies of Titus in AD 70. By destroying the earthly
elements of the Old Covenant, God was dissolving that Old Covenant
and replacing it with the New Covenant in real historical time.
Symbolic Number
So the 144,000 were the Jewish Christians in first-century Israel,
and more particularly in the city of Jerusalem, who were protected
from God’s wrath by leaving the city and fleeing to the mountains
before it was destroyed by the Romans in AD 70.
Was there exactly 144,000 or was that merely symbolic? It
doesn’t really matter. There were so few Christians at that time period
that it might have been for all we know. Though the biblical usage of
numbers like 12 tribes multiplied by 12 apostles multiplied by 1000,
the number of perfect completion, is a little too obvious to deny.
The tribulation was already ongoing when John wrote the
Revelation. The gathering of the persecuted remnant with the Gentiles
all over the empire was the beginning creation of the body of Christ
that would soon spread the Gospel beyond Jerusalem and Samaria to
the ends of the earth (Acts 1:8). Particularly in the holy land, the
Christians were spared and earthly Israel was judged. Of course there
is more to it than that, but at least the reader can get an idea of the big
picture narrative and how it all fits into the fulfillment of the promised
remnant regathering. For all the details of how Revelation was
fulfilled in the first century, see Kenneth Gentry’s game-changing
commentary, The Divorce of Israel: A Redemptive-Historical
Interpretation of Revelation (GA: Tolle Lege Press, 2017).
This brief excursion into the theology of the regathering of the
remnant of Israel illustrates just how poetic, beautiful and glorious the
New Covenant is, just how true and real the heavenly land, city and
temple is as embodied in the Body of Christ, his Church. The Bible is
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not a racist document that maintains the eternal superiority of a single
geopolitical nation or chance genetic birth of a single ethnic
demographic. In all corners of the Old Testament, God foretold that he
would one day transform his Old Covenant with a New Covenant that
would draw peoples from every tribe and nation into covenant with
the Messiah of all the earth. Amen.
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11
Old Testament Shadow,
New Testament Reality
This table below is a verse-by-verse comparison of how the New
Testament illustrates that the Church of Jesus Christ is the true Israel
of God. Every term used in the Old Testament that Dispensationalists
think applies to physical Israel according to the flesh, is actually
applied to the Christian Church according to the Spirit. There cannot
be two plans or two God’s people when one of them fulfills it all. This
is not a “replacement” of Israel with the Church, for the Church
(“congregation of the Lord”) that consists of both Jew and Gentile
believers, is Israel regathered as a remnant in the New Covenant. The
Old Covenant land, city and temple were mere shadows of the
heavenly reality in New Covenant Christ.
Old Testament Shadow
Genesis 17:5
“No longer shall your name be
called Abram, But your name
shall be Abraham; For I will make
you the father of a multitude of
nations. 6 “And I will make you
exceedingly fruitful, and I will
make nations of you, and kings
shall come forth from you. 7
“And I will establish My covenant
between Me and you and your
descendants after you throughout
their generations for an
Biblical Term
New Testament Reality
Children of
Abraham
Galatians 3:6–9
6
just as Abraham “believed God,
and it was counted to him as
righteousness”? 7 Know then that it
is those of faith who are the sons
of Abraham. 8 And the Scripture,
foreseeing that God would justify
the Gentiles by faith, preached the
gospel beforehand to Abraham,
saying, “In you shall all the nations
be blessed.” 9 So then, those who
are of faith are blessed along with
Abraham, the man of faith.
87
everlasting covenant, to be God to
you and to your descendants after
you.
(Also Gen 11:1-3)
(Also Rom 4:13-17; Gal 3:29)
Genesis 17:19
But God said, “No, but Sarah your
wife shall bear you a son, and you
shall call his name Isaac; and I
will establish My covenant with
him for an everlasting covenant
for his descendants after him.
(Also Gen 17:5-7)
Romans 9:8
8
This means that it is not the
children of the flesh who are the
children of God, but the children
of the promise are counted as
offspring.
(Also Joh 1:12; Joh 11:52; Ro
8:16)
Genesis 21: 10
Therefore she said to Abraham,
“Drive out this maid and her son,
for the son of this maid shall not
be an heir with my son Isaac.” 11
And the matter distressed
Abraham greatly because of his
son. 12 But God said to Abraham,
“Do not be distressed because of
the lad and your maid; whatever
Sarah tells you, listen to her, for
through Isaac your descendants
shall be named. 13 “And of the
son of the maid I will make a
nation also, because he is your
descendant.”
Galatians 4:24–31
24
Now this may be interpreted
allegorically: these women are two
covenants. One is from Mount
Sinai, bearing children for slavery;
she is Hagar. 25 Now Hagar is
Mount Sinai in Arabia; she
corresponds to the present
Jerusalem, for she is in slavery
with her children. 26 But the
Jerusalem above is free, and she is
our mother. 27 For it is written,
“Rejoice, O barren one who does
not bear; break forth and cry aloud,
you who are not in labor! For the
children of the desolate one will be
more than those of the one who has
a husband.” 28 Now you, brothers,
like Isaac, are children of
promise. 29 But just as at that time
he who was born according to the
flesh persecuted him who was born
according to the Spirit, so also it is
now. 30 But what does the
Scripture say? “Cast out the slave
woman and her son, for the son of
the slave woman shall not inherit
with the son of the free woman.” 31
So, brothers, we are not children
of the slave but of the free
woman.
Children of
Promise
Isaiah 54:
1 “Shout for joy, O barren one,
you who have borne no child;
Break forth into joyful shouting
and cry aloud, you who have not
travailed; For the sons of the
desolate one will be more
numerous Than the sons of the
married woman,” says the LORD.
...3 “For you will spread abroad to
the right and to the left. And your
descendants will possess nations,
And they will resettle the desolate
cities.
Exodus 19:6
and you shall be to Me a kingdom
of priests and a holy nation.’
These are the words that you shall
speak to the sons of Israel.”
Holy Nation
88
1 Peter 2:9
9
But you are a chosen race, a royal
priesthood, a holy nation, a people
for his own possession,
Exodus 19:6
and you shall be to Me a kingdom
of priests and a holy nation.’
These are the words that you shall
speak to the sons of Israel.”
Deuteronomy 7:6
“For you are a holy people to the
LORD your God; the LORD your
God has chosen you to be a
people for His own possession
out of all the peoples who are on
the face of the earth. (Also De
4:20)
Isaiah 43:20
“The beasts of the field will
glorify Me; ... Because I have
given waters in the wilderness
And rivers in the desert, To give
drink to My chosen people.(Also
De 7:6; 14:2; Isa 45:4)
Royal
Priesthood
People for
God’s Own
Possession
Chosen
People
Isaiah 24:23
For the LORD of hosts will reign
on Mount Zion and in Jerusalem,
And His glory will be before His
elders.
Zechariah 8:3
“Thus says the LORD, ‘I will
return to Zion and will dwell in
the midst of Jerusalem. Then
Jerusalem will be called the City
of Truth, and the mountain of the
LORD of hosts will be called the
Holy Mountain.’
Zechariah 8:3
“Thus says the LORD, ‘I will
return to Zion and will dwell in
the midst of Jerusalem. Then
Jerusalem will be called the City
of Truth, and the mountain of the
LORD of hosts will be called the
Holy Mountain.’
(Also Zec 1:17; Mic 4:2)
Isaiah 44:21
“Remember these things, O Jacob,
And Israel, for you are My
servant; I have formed you, you
are My servant, O Israel, you will
Mount Zion
Jerusalem
Israel
1 Peter 2:9
9
But you are a chosen race, a
royal priesthood, a holy nation, a
people for his own possession,
1 Peter 2:9
9
But you are a chosen race, a royal
priesthood, a holy nation, a people
for his own possession,
1 Peter 2:9
9
But you are a chosen race, a
royal priesthood, a holy nation, a
people for his own possession,
(Also Col 3:12; Re 17:14)
Hebrews 12:22–24
22
But you have come to Mount
Zion and to the city of the living
God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and
to innumerable angels in festal
gathering, 23 and to the assembly of
the firstborn who are enrolled in
heaven, and to God, the judge of
all, and to the spirits of the
righteous made perfect, 24 and to
Jesus, the mediator of a new
covenant, and to the sprinkled
blood that speaks a better word
than the blood of Abel.
Hebrews 12:22–24
22
But you have come to Mount
Zion and to the city of the living
God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and
to innumerable angels in festal
gathering, 23 and to the assembly of
the firstborn who are enrolled in
heaven.
Galatians 6:15
For neither is circumcision
anything, nor uncircumcision, but a
new creation. 16 And those who
will walk by this rule, peace and
89
not be forgotten by Me.
mercy be upon them, and upon the
Israel of God.
Isaiah 45:17
Israel has been saved by the
LORD With an everlasting
salvation; You will not be put to
shame or humiliated To all
eternity.
Romans 9:6
But it is not as though the word of
God has failed. For they are not all
Israel who are descended from
Israel;
Jeremiah 10:16
The portion of Jacob is not like
these; For the Maker of all is He,
And Israel is the tribe of His
inheritance; The LORD of hosts is
His name.
Ephesians 2:12
Remember that you were at that
time separate from Christ, excluded
from the commonwealth of Israel,
and strangers to the covenants of
promise, ... But now in Christ Jesus
you who formerly were far off have
been brought near by the blood of
Christ. 14 For He Himself is our
peace, who made both groups into
one, and broke down the barrier
of the dividing wall, 15 by
abolishing in His flesh the enmity,
which is the Law of commandments
contained in ordinances, that in
Himself He might make the two
into one new man,
Jeremiah 30: 31
“Behold, days are coming,”
declares the LORD, “when I will
make a new covenant with the
house of Israel and with the
house of Judah, 32 not like the
covenant which I made with their
fathers in the day I took them by
the hand to bring them out of the
land of Egypt, My covenant
which they broke, although I was
a husband to them, “declares the
LORD. 33 “But this is the
covenant which I will make with
the house of Israel after those
days,” declares the LORD, “I will
put My law within them, and on
their heart I will write it; and I
will be their God, and they shall
be My people. 34 “And they shall
not teach again, each man his
neighbor and each man his
brother, saying, ‘Know the
LORD,’ for they shall all know
Me, from the least of them to the
greatest of them,” declares the
LORD, “for I will forgive their
Hebrews 8:6–13
6
But as it is, Christ has obtained a
ministry that is as much more
excellent than the old as the
covenant he mediates is better,
since it is enacted on better
promises. 7 For if that first
covenant had been faultless, there
would have been no occasion to
look for a second. 8 For he finds
fault with them when he says:
“Behold, the days are coming,
declares the Lord, when I will
establish a new covenant with the
house of Israel and with the house
of Judah, … For this is the
covenant that I will make with
the house of Israel after those
days, declares the Lord: I will put
my laws into their minds, and write
them on their hearts, and I will be
their God, and they shall be my
people. 11 And they shall not teach,
each one his neighbor and each one
his brother, saying, ‘Know the
Lord,’ for they shall all know me,
from the least of them to the
New
Covenant
90
iniquity, and their sin I will
remember no more.”
greatest. 12 For I will be merciful
toward their iniquities, and I will
remember their sins no more.” 13
In speaking of a new covenant,
he makes the first one obsolete.
And what is becoming obsolete
and growing old is ready to vanish
away.
Psalm 46:4
There is a river whose streams
make glad the city of God, The
holy dwelling places of the Most
High.
Ps 87:3 Glorious things are
spoken of you, O city of God.
Hebrews 8:22
But you have come to Mount Zion
and to the city of the living God,
the heavenly Jerusalem, and to
myriads of angels...
City of God
Deuteronomy 30: 6
“Moreover the LORD your God
will circumcise your heart and
the heart of your descendants, to
love the LORD your God.
Jeremiah 4:4
“Circumcise yourselves to the
LORD And remove the foreskins
of your heart, Men of Judah and
inhabitants of Jerusalem...
Circumcised
Heart
Jeremiah 9:25
“Behold, the days are coming,”
declares the LORD, “that I will
punish all who are circumcised
and yet uncircumcised...for all
the nations are uncircumcised, and
all the house of Israel are
uncircumcised of heart.”
Isaiah 10:22-23
For though your people, O Israel,
may be like the sand of the sea,
Only a remnant within them will
return; A destruction is
determined, overflowing with
righteousness. For a complete
destruction, one that is decreed, the
Lord GOD of hosts will execute in
the midst of the whole land.
Isaiah 46:3
“Listen to Me, O house of Jacob,
And all the remnant of the
house of Israel, You who have
Remnant
Romans 2: 28
For he is not a Jew who is one
outwardly; neither is circumcision
that which is outward in the flesh.
29 But he is a Jew who is one
inwardly; and circumcision is
that which is of the heart, by the
Spirit, not by the letter; and his
praise is not from men, but from
God.
Colossians 2:11
and in Him you were also
circumcised with a circumcision
made without hands, in the
removal of the body of the flesh by
the circumcision of Christ;
Romans 9:27–29
27
And Isaiah cries out concerning
Israel: “Though the number of the
sons of Israel be as the sand of the
sea, only a remnant of them will
be saved, 28 for the Lord will carry
out his sentence upon the earth
fully and without delay.” 29 And as
Isaiah predicted, “If the Lord of
hosts had not left us offspring,
we would have been like Sodom
and become like Gomorrah.”
Romans 11:1-7
I say then, God has not rejected
91
been borne by Me from birth, And
have been carried from the womb;
His people, has He? May it never
be!...God has not rejected His
people whom He foreknew....In the
same way then, there has also
come to be at the present time a
remnant according to God’s
gracious choice... What then? That
which Israel is seeking for, it has
not obtained, but those who were
chosen obtained it, and the rest
were hardened;
Jeremiah 22:3-6
“Then I Myself shall gather the
remnant of My flock out of all
the countries where I have driven
them and shall bring them back to
their pasture; and they will be
fruitful and multiply...“Behold,
the days are coming,” declares the
LORD, “When I shall raise up
for David a righteous Branch;
[Jesus] And He will reign as king
and act wisely And do justice and
righteousness in the land. “In His
days Judah will be saved, And
Israel will dwell securely;
1Peter 1:1
Peter, an apostle of Jesus Christ, to
those who reside as aliens,
scattered..who are chosen]
2Chronicles 7:14
and My people who are called by
My name humble themselves and
pray,
Hosea 1:10
Yet the number of the sons of
Israel Will be like the sand of the
sea, Which cannot be measured or
numbered; And it will come about
that, in the place Where it is said
to them, “You are not My
people,” It will be said to them,
“You are the sons of the living
God.”
Acts 15:17
17
that the remnant of mankind may
seek the Lord, and all the Gentiles
who are called by my name, says
the Lord
My People
Called by My
Name
Jeremiah 31:33
“But this is the covenant which I
will make with the house of Israel
after those days,” declares the
LORD, “I will put My law within
them, and on their heart I will
write it; and I will be their God,
and they shall be My people.
Exodus 29:45
“And I will dwell among the sons
of Israel and will be their God. 46
“And they shall know that I am
the LORD their God who brought
them out of the land of Egypt, that
I might dwell among them; I am
the LORD their God.
Romans 9:25–26
25
As indeed he says in Hosea,
“Those who were not my people I
will call ‘my people,’ and her who
was not beloved I will call
‘beloved.’ ” 26 “And in the very
place where it was said to them,
‘You are not my people,’ there
they will be called ‘sons of the
living God.’ ”
2 Corinthians 6:16
God said, “I will make my
dwelling among them and walk
among them, and I will be their
God, and they shall be my
people.
16
Temple,
God’s
Dwelling
Place
Leviticus 26:12
92
Ephesians 2:19–22
19
So then you are no longer
strangers and aliens, but you are
fellow citizens with the saints and
members of the household of
God, 20 built on the foundation of
the apostles and prophets, Christ
Jesus himself being the
cornerstone, 21 in whom the whole
structure, being joined together,
‘I will also walk among you and
be your God, and you shall be My
people.
grows into a holy temple in the
Lord. 22 In him you also are
being built together into a
dwelling place for God by the
Spirit.
Exodus 25:8
“And let them construct a
sanctuary for Me, that I may
dwell among them.
Israel
2 Corinthians 6:16
16
For we are the temple of the
living God; as God said, “I will
make my dwelling among them
and walk among them, and I will
be their God, and they shall be my
people.
Biblical Term
Genesis 17:8
“And I will give to you
[Abraham] and to your offspring
after you the land of your
sojournings, all the land of
Canaan, for an everlasting
possession.”
Fulfilled in Christ
2 Corinthians 1:20
For all the promises of God find
their Yes in him [Jesus].
The Land
Promise to
Abraham
Hebrews 11:8–10
By faith Abraham obeyed when he
was called to go out to a place that
he was to receive as an inheritance.
And he went out, not knowing
where he was going. By faith he
went to live in the land of
promise, as in a foreign land,
living in tents with Isaac and
Jacob, heirs with him of the same
promise. For he was looking
forward to the city that has
foundations, whose designer and
builder is God.
Hebrews 11:15–16
If they had been thinking of that
land from which they had gone
out, they would have had
opportunity to return. But as it is,
they desire a better country, that
is, a heavenly one. Therefore God
is not ashamed to be called their
God, for he has prepared for
them a city.
Hebrews 12:22–24
But you have come to Mount
Zion and to the city of the living
God, the heavenly Jerusalem…
and to Jesus, the mediator of a
new covenant. [Jesus is Mount
Zion, heavenly Jerusalem]
93
Deuteronomy 30:3
then the Lord your God will
restore your fortunes and have
mercy on you, and he will gather
you again from all the peoples
where the Lord your God has
scattered you.
Restoration
to the Land
Ezekiel 37:12
“Thus says the Lord God: Behold,
I will open your graves and raise
you from your graves, O my
people. And I will bring you into
the land of Israel.”
Deuteronomy 32:8–9
When the Most High gave to the
nations their inheritance, when
he divided mankind, he fixed the
borders of the peoples according
to the number of the sons of God.
But the Lord’s portion is his
people, Jacob his allotted heritage.
Genesis 17:8
“And I will give to you
[Abraham] and to your offspring
[seed] after you the land of your
sojournings, all the land of
Canaan, for an everlasting
possession.”
Ezekiel 43:7
“Son of man, this is the place of
my throne…where I will dwell
in the midst of the people of
Israel forever.
Resurrection
of Israel =
receiving the
Land
inheritance
Acts 2:5–11
[Pentecost was the fulfillment of
gathering the Jews “from all the
nations” into the land—but in
Christ that is fulfilled]
Now there were dwelling in
Jerusalem Jews, devout men from
every nation under
heaven…“Are not all these who
are speaking Galileans? And how
is it that we hear, each of us in his
own native language? Parthians
and Medes and Elamites and
residents of Mesopotamia, Judea
and Cappadocia, Pontus and Asia,
Phrygia and Pamphylia, Egypt and
the parts of Libya belonging to
Cyrene, and visitors from Rome,
both Jews and proselytes, Cretans
and Arabians—we hear them
telling in our own tongues the
mighty works of God.”
1 Peter 1:3–4
According to his great mercy, he
has caused us to be born again to a
living hope through the
resurrection of Jesus Christ from
the dead, to an inheritance that
is imperishable, undefiled, and
unfading, kept in heaven for you.
Hebrews 9:15
Therefore he is the mediator of a
new covenant, so that those who
are called may receive the
promised eternal inheritance
The Seed
Promise to
Abraham
Galatians 3:16
Now the promises were made to
Abraham and to his offspring
[seed]. It does not say, “And to
offsprings,” referring to many, but
referring to one, “And to your
offspring,” who is Christ.
The Temple
John 1:14
And the Word became flesh and
dwelt [tabernacled=temple]
among us, and we have seen his
glory.
94
John 2:19–21
Jesus answered them, “Destroy this
temple, and in three days I will
raise it up.” The Jews then said, “It
has taken forty-six years to build
this temple, and will you raise it up
in three days?” But he was
speaking about the temple of his
body.
Isaiah 41:8–9
But you, Israel, my servant, Jacob,
whom I have chosen, the
offspring of Abraham, my friend;
you whom I took from the ends of
the earth, and called from its
farthest corners, saying to you,
“You are my servant, I have
chosen you and not cast you off”
Matthew 8:14–17
That evening they brought to him
many who were oppressed by
demons, and he cast out the spirits
with a word and healed all who
were sick. This was to fulfill what
was spoken by the prophet
Isaiah: “He took our illnesses
and bore our diseases.”
Isaiah 53:1
Who has believed what he has
heard from us? And to whom has
the arm of the Lord been
revealed?
John 12:38
so that the word spoken by the
prophet Isaiah might be fulfilled:
“Lord, who has believed what he
heard from us, and to whom has
the arm of the Lord been
revealed?”
Isaiah 53:7–8
He was oppressed, and he was
afflicted, yet he opened not his
mouth; like a lamb that is led to
the slaughter, and like a sheep that
before its shearers is silent, so he
opened not his mouth…he was cut
off out of the land of the living,
stricken for the transgression of
my people
Isaiah 53:12
Therefore I will divide him [My
Servant] a portion with the many,
and he shall divide the spoil with
the strong, because he poured out
his soul to death and was
numbered with the transgressors;
yet he bore the sin of many, and
makes intercession for the
transgressors.
My Servant =
Israel
Jesus is
therefore
Israel
Acts 8:32–35 (ESV)
Now the passage of the Scripture
that he was reading was this: “Like
a sheep he was led to the slaughter
and like a lamb before its shearer is
silent, so he opens not his mouth.
In his humiliation justice was
denied him.
Luke 22:36–38
“For I tell you that this Scripture
must be fulfilled in me: ‘And he
was numbered with the
transgressors.’ For what is written
about me has its fulfillment.”
95
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